13 October 2011 Last updated at 10:55 GMT
Nepal bus plunges off mountain road 'killing 43'
BBC News
====================================
At least 43 people were killed when a bus veered off a mountain road into a river in eastern Nepal, police say.
Other passengers are missing after the accident in remote Sindhuli district, about 100km (62 miles) from Kathmandu.
The bus swerved on an unfinished stretch of road, lost control and plummeted 300 metres into the Sunkosi river, police told the AFP news agency.
Buses are often overcrowded in Nepal and accidents on poorly maintained mountain roads are common.
Police, soldiers and villagers are having a hard time reaching the wreckage of the bus.
A number of people are feared trapped inside - others may have been swept away by the fast-flowing river.
"Forty-three dead bodies have already been recovered and the bus has been destroyed. It is likely that more bodies will be found near the crash site, which is very remote," police official Lokendra Shrestha told AFP.
Nepal's packed buses are even more crowded than normal at this time of the year as people travel back to work from their home villages at the end of the two-week national festival, Dashain.
Police say the bus in the accident was travelling along the BP Koirala Highway, a narrow road with hairpin bends that in many places is wide enough only to allow one vehicle to pass.
No comments:
Post a Comment