A tour bus tumbled off a mountain road in Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province, on Wednesday afternoon, killing 17 passengers and injuring 14 others.
The accident occurred at 5:40 p.m. at Hyeongok-myeon in Gyeongju, the ancient capital of the Silla Dynasty, some 370 kilometers southeast of Seoul.
The bus was carrying 31 passengers, including the driver --- most of them in their 70s and 80s --- who were returning from a trip to a hot spring resort in Ulsan City. The death toll is feared to rise further as some of the injured are in serious condition. Those injured are being treated at nearby hospitals.
There's a short video report here from MBC which shows how winding the road is. A clip on KBS last night, which I can't find online now, had an animated recreation of what is thought to have happened: the bus hit the guardrail, failed to make a subsequent turn, and tumbled down the hill until hitting a tree and stopping. Other Korean-language articles and video clips are collected on Naver.
4 comments:
That's such a tragedy... I can't believe the death toll was so high. I saw the pictures on the front of some local newspaper yesterday and it looked horrific.
I've been on some of those mountain passes, particularly in Gangwon. It's enough to make you want to take the train everywhere.
Saw this on the news this morning and was so sad. :-(
Not far from where I live. But even still, the first thing I thought was...how many people on that bus were wearing seatbelts. My guess is less than 5%.
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