South African Bus Crash Fatalities Include Britons

Nine people were today feared dead after a bus carrying a group of 19 largely British and Canadian tourists crashed in South Africa.

The accident took place near Piet Retief in the Assegai valley, Mpumalanga province, a hilly area popular with tourists. The bus driver appeared to have lost control of the vehicle in heavy rain.

Nick Sheppard, spokesman for the British high commission in South Africa, said: "We understand that nine have been killed but we don't know as yet what proportion were British."

The injured were taken to a hospital in Piet Retief for treatment but the extent of their injuries was not known, he added.

Mr Sheppard said there was no indication as yet that any other vehicle was involved in the accident.

Dr Melinda de Klerk, a casualty officer at Piet Retief hospital, said she understood that 21 people had been involved in the crash, nine of whom had been killed.

"We had 12 people brought into our casualty department. Three are in a critical condition and are being transferred to hospital in Pretoria," she said.

"We have seven with minor injuries who are being treated and will then be moved and there are two more who we are trying to stabilise."

Dr De Klerk said the three people in a critical condition were a South African, a German woman and a man from Scotland. The South African and Scot had serious head injuries and the German woman had leg injuries, she added.

"Most of them who are not badly injured will be moved to other hospitals. This is just a small primary health hospital," she added.

In recent years, South Africa has become notorious for a series of bus crashes that have left both tourists and local people dead and injured.

In September 1999, 26 elderly British tourists died when the Springbok Atlas bus they were travelling in overturned on the Long Tom Pass outside Lydenburg.

Their South African guide was also killed and many other Britons were injured when the bus veered off the mountain pass.

The accident was the fifth fatal bus crash in the country in the same week, with more than 60 fatalities.

After the spate of crashes the South African government vowed to take measures to tackle the problem of badly kept roads, blamed for many of the accidents.