THREE people died and 19 were injured yesterday when a City Link luxury bus travelling from Bulawayo to Harare was involved in a head-on collision with a Nissan UD tuck just after Norton.
FELUNA NLEYA STAFF REPORTER
Traffic along the Harare-Bulawayo Road came to a halt as fire fighters rescued passengers in the two vehicles involved in the accident.
Police spokesperson senior assistant commissioner Charity Charamba said the driver saw a veld fire on the right side of the road at the 43km peg along the Harare-Bulawayo Road.
“The bus driver tried to pass through the smoke and in the process had a head-on collision with the Nissan UD lorry which was travelling in the opposite direction,” she said.
Charamba said among the three people that died were the bus driver, his co-driver and the lorry driver.
Six of the injured were taken to Norton Hospital while 13 others were ferried to Parirenyatwa Hospital in Harare.
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A City Link manager Gerald Matapure said: “It’s sad that life is lost when accidents happen. “We will assist them so they have a decent burial.”
A woman, who was a passenger in the bus with her two young children aged two and a half years and 14 months respectively, said it was a miracle that she and her children had survived the accident.
“I was in the bus with my two children and that we are alive is a miracle,” she said.
“I don’t even know what happened. I just found my younger baby sitting on top of the truck not knowing how the baby got there. I only want to thank God for saving us from this accident.”
The accident comes two days after another crash claimed three lives and left five others injured when a haulage truck collided head-on with a Harare-bound fuel tanker at the 69km peg along the Harare-Masvingo Highway.