Spain bus crash kills nine

The Spanish bus wreckage

 Nine folks have lost their lives after a bus that they were travelling in staggered off a central Spanish highway before ramming into a metal safety barrier on Monday.  Twenty two people sustained injuries during the accident which left most of them trapped in the wreckage according to the emergency services for the region of Castile and Leon. The bus was travelling downhill near Avila northwest of Madrid.

Window glasses on the entire right-hand side of the bus were completely smashed leaving the buckled frames left exposed. The broken windscreen hung open like a curtain while the front seats popped out of the huge front space. According to eye witnesses nine people have died and 22 have been injured. Close to 10 ambulances, two medical helicopters and teams of fire-fighters converged on the scene. Four bodies lay on the N-403 road, completely covered in white sheets and foil.

Armoured emergency services workers in black helmets and suits were seen carrying people away in stretchers.

The bus had been heading to the provincial capital Avila from the province's southern town of Serranillos and was less than 10 kilometres (six miles) from its destination when disaster struck at about 8:45 am (0645 GMT).

“The cause of the accident still remains idiopathic “said the central government representative for Avila, Ramiro Ruiz Medrano."They are investigating the possible causes at the moment," Medrano told Spanish public radio.

"There are some with very serious injuries, others are in shock," he said. The driver was uninjured, Medrano said.

The vehicle's insurance papers and road worthiness certificates were in order, he added. The injured were taken to hospitals in Avila for treatment or to be checked, emergency services said.

One six-year-old girl was flown about 100 kilometres (60 miles) by helicopter to a major hospital in Salamanca.

A team of psychologists were comforting the victims' families, who were taken to the Avila sports stadium. A tow-truck later towed away the ruined shell of the bus. Nearby civil guards directed traffic and searched in the long grass beside the road where the metal barrier lay squashed. It was the deadliest bus accident since April 2008 when nine Finnish tourists were killed in a crash in southern Spain's Andalusia region.

That accident was blamed on a drunken, speeding driver of a four-wheel-drive car who tried to overtake but hit the safety barrier and then collided with the bus. In the last major bus accident in Spain on July 31, 2009, six Dutch tourists were killed and 39 injured when their bus overturned on a motorway curve near the northeastern city of Barcelona.