Church visit ends in flames
2006-09-28
A JOYFUL journey to a church meeting in Worcester almost ended in tragedy for more than sixty church-goers, when the bus they were travelling in, caught alight on the bridge on the approach to the Huguenot tunnel.
The passengers, all from Khayelitsha, were on their way to a gathering at the Old Apostolic Church when the incident took place.
One of the passengers said that they could smell smoke in the bus when they were travelling through Stellenbosch.
“It just got worse when we got onto the N1 and when I warned the bus driver about this, he ignored me.”
Near the tunnel, chaos broke out when the flames started pouring out from the base of the bus.
The driver and many of the passengers jumped from the still moving vehicle to safety.
After the driver had jumped out, the bus started rolling backwards, down the hill, but came to a halt when it collided with a barrier at the side of the road.
Two women, Veronica Magwa and Nkosasana Layini, were seriously injured while jumping out of the bus. Another 25 passengers were taken to hospitals in Paarl and Stellenbosch with minor injuries.
The N1 was closed for several hours while the wreckage of the bus was removed.
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