HELSINKI (AP) — Finland's defense department says 12 military conscripts ended up in the hospital after an armored personnel carrier tried to avert a reindeer and was hit by a second vehicle.

The Finnish Defense Forces said five of the injured recruits remained under observation on Wednesday. The rest have returned to training after Tuesday's crash in Finland's Lapland region.

Reindeer wander the vast, deserted region in northern Finland, and herders tend to as many as 200,000 animals.

Thousands of the roaming caribou are killed by vehicles. Finnish herders paint reindeer antlers in fluorescent colors, hand reflectors around the animal's and used movable traffic signs to reduce some of the road deaths.