KOLKATA: At least 36 people were killed in eastern India’s West Bengal state early Monday after a speeding passenger bus swerved off a bridge and plunged into a river, police said.
Initial investigations and eye witness accounts said the bus driver, who also died in the accident, lost control while trying to overtake another vehicle on the bridge.
The bus crashed into the bridge’s side railing before plummeting 12 meters (40 feet) into the local Bhairav river.
“Rescuers have retrieved 36 bodies so far. Nine passengers have been hospitalized,” state’s transport minister Subhendu Adhikari told AFP.
Rescue workers believe that there were more than 50 passengers on the bus at the time of the accident.
The rescue work at the accident site in Murshidabad district, around 187 miles (300 kilometers) from the state capital Kolkata, was ongoing late Monday evening.
“We fear that some of the passengers were swept away as glass windows of the vehicle broke (on impact),” Adhikari said.
The victims include at-least nine women and four children.
The bus lay submerged on the riverbed till emergency workers dragged it to a riverbank.
The rescue workers then used steel cutters to cut open the mangled vehicle and retrieve victims’ bodies.
At least 32 people were killed in another road accident after a bus plunged into a river in western Rajasthan state this December.
India has some of the world’s deadliest roads.
More than 150,000 people are killed each year with most accidents blamed on poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving.
At least 36 dead as bus plunges off bridge in eastern India
At least 36 dead as bus plunges off bridge in eastern India
Russian drone attack forces power cuts in Ukraine’s Kryvyi Rih, military says
- Kyiv says the campaign has forced rolling outages and emergency cuts to cities across the country, as repair crews work under fire and Ukraine relies on air defenses and electricity imports to stabilize the grid
KYIV: Russian drones struck infrastructure in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih on Wednesday, forcing emergency power blackouts for more than 45,000 customers and disrupting heat supplies, military administration head Oleksandr Vilkul said.
“Please fill up on water and charge your devices, if you have the chance. It’s going to be difficult,” Vilkul said on the Telegram messaging app.
Water utility pumping stations switched to generators and water remained in the system, but there could be pressure problems.
The full scale of the attack was not immediately known. There was no comment from Russia about the strike.
Russia has repeatedly struck Ukraine’s power plants, substations and transmission lines with missiles and drones, seeking to knock out electricity and heating and hinder industry during the nearly four-year war.
Kyiv says the campaign has forced rolling outages and emergency cuts to cities across the country, as repair crews work under fire and Ukraine relies on air defenses and electricity imports to stabilize the grid.
Kryvyi Rih, a steel-and-mining hub in the Dnipropetrovsk region and President Volodymyr Zelensky’s hometown, has been hit repeatedly, with strikes killing civilians and damaging homes and industry.
The city sits close enough to southern front lines to be within strike range, while its factories, logistics links and workforce make it economically important and a key rear-area center supporting Ukraine’s war effort.
