Saturday 20 February 2016

Ghana: One of history's deadliest bus crashes



This week’s bus crash in Ghana was one of the deadliest in history. 71 people were killed, and another 13 seriously injured, when a coach collided head-on with a lorry carrying tomatoes near the town of Kintampo, about 260 miles from the capital, Accra.

It was travelling from the country’s second city Kumasi to the northern town of Tamale. Investigators have said the bus was overloaded. It should have been carrying only 63 passengers. 

A survivor reportedly told police that the vehicle had brake problems. Another alleged the driver had been going too fast, and that he had ignored pleas to slow down.

Rescue workers had to use chainsaws to try to get to people trapped in the wreckage. There was anger about graphic images of the accident that were posed on social media, while Ghana’s president, John Mahama, went on to Twitter to offer his condolences. (See also my blogs of 5 January and 23 February 2010 and 9 February 2013.)

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