At least 42 dead in France road crash
At least 42 dead in France road crash
At least 42 people, most of them elderly, were killed when a coach
collided with a lorry in southwestern France early Friday, a fire
service official said.
All but one of the victims were passengers on the coach, while the
other fatality was the driver of the lorry, local authorities in the
prefecture of Gironde said.
The two vehicles collided head-on near the village of Puisseguin
north of Bordeaux. The crash is the deadliest in France since 1982.
“The French government has fully mobilised after this terrible
tragedy,” President Francois Hollande said from Athens, where he is on
an official visit.
Five passengers — who managed to escape from the coach, which had
caught fire — sustained light injuries. Three others were unharmed,
local authorities said.
Several emergency vehicles were dispatched to the scene.
The coach, which was carrying 49 passengers and a driver, had
departed early Friday from a village near the site of the accident to
take its elderly passengers out on an excursion.
A resident told TV channel I-tele that the crash occurred at a turn known to locals as dangerous.
