Boat capsize and bus accident claim 51 lives in Pakistan

At least 51 people were killed in two separate transport accidents in West Pakistan on Sunday when a bus plunged off a bridge and a boat carrying a class of children capsized.

Forty-one have so far been confirmed dead after their bus crashed into a ravine in southwestern Balochistan province, while at least 10 students died in the boating accident in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, officials said.

Up to nine are still missing in the waters, local police said, as a rescue operation is underway.

At the remote site of the bus accident, north of the town of Bela in Lasbela district, a senior administration official, Hamza Anjum, said that “the dead bodies…are unrecognizable”.

Anjum said 40 bodies were recovered from the wreckage, in addition to three injured, one of whom died shortly afterwards. The remaining two survivors were in “serious” condition.

The bus was reportedly carrying a total of 48 passengers when it crashed into a pillar on the bridge earlier on Sunday and went off course.

It had traveled overnight between Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan, and the southern port city of Karachi.

“It is feared that the driver may have fallen asleep,” Anjum said, also pointing to the possibility that he had been speeding on the long-distance journey.

“We will investigate the causes of the accident,” he said, adding that DNA testing would be used to identify the remains who were “severely mutilated”.

rescue operation

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, local police official Mir Rauf told AFP that all the dead recovered from the lake so far were between the ages of seven and 14.

He said 11 more children had been rescued, six of them in critical condition. However, nine others are still missing from the madrassah class who were on a day trip.

“A rescue operation is underway,” Rauf told AFP.

Dilapidated highways, lax safety measures and reckless driving contribute to Pakistan’s abysmal road safety record.

Passenger buses are often packed and seatbelts are not often worn, which means that there are many fatalities in single-vehicle crashes.

In November, 20 people, including 11 children, were killed when a minibus crashed into a deep and swampy ditch in southern Pakistan.

More than 27,000 people died on Pakistan’s roads in 2018, according to estimates by the World Health Organization.

Mass drownings are also common in Pakistan when aging and overloaded ships lose stability and throw passengers into the water.