DHAKA: A tour bus traveling through countryside in northwest China toppled off a steep hillside in Shaanxi Province on Friday, killing at least 35 people, according to state-run news media.
It appeared to be the deadliest traffic accident in nine months in China, where the government has struggled to curtail the danger on roads and highways.
The bus, traveling through Chunhua County, had about 46 people on board when it went off the side of the road, according to news reports citing county officials.
Rescuers who rushed to the site found 25 people dead, and others died later at the site or in a hospital, despite attempts to save them.
Photographs of the accident showed that the bus appeared to have careened off the road when making a sharp turn and then sliced through bushes on the steep, uneven hillside and slammed into a flat, grassy area. Investigators had made the preliminary finding that the accident was caused by an “operating error” at the turn, Xinhua, the main official news agency, reported.
The passengers on the bus were nearby residents, mostly elderly, who had joined a two-day tour, Xinhua said. Fifteen men and 20 women died, including the driver; 11 people survived and were being treated in local hospitals, said the report.
China’s rapid economic growth has drawn growing numbers of cars, trucks and buses onto roads where, especially in the countryside, rules are often poorly observed and enforced.
In recent years, the Chinese police have become stricter in enforcing road rules, but deadly accidents are still frequent. This month, Bernhard Schwartländer, the World Health Organization’s representative in China, estimated that more than 200,000 people were killed in traffic accidents across the country every year, which is much higher than government estimates.
The bus accident appeared to be deadliest in China since August last year, when a tour bus in Tibet tumbled down a valley and 44 people died.
In July last year, a truck smashed into a crowded bus in Hunan Province, in southern China, setting off a fiery eruption and killing at least 43 people.
Source: nytimes.com
BDST: 0936 HRS, MAY 16, 2015
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