29 German tourists die in Madeira bus crash
Madeira began three days of mourning yesterday for 29 German tourists who died after their bus veered off a steep road, as Germany’s foreign minister and a trauma team flew to the Portuguese island to meet survivors.
The bus, carrying 55 tourists and one guide, overturned on Wednesday evening in the coastal town of Canico, its mayor Filipe Sousa said.
Portugal’s public prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into the accident, whose cause authorities said they could not yet determine. Local TV channel SIC attributed it to either brake failure or a problem with the accelerator cable.
In Berlin, foreign minister Heiko Maas said he would fly to Madeira with a team of doctors, psychologists and consular officials to meet those affected and thank Portugal for its help.
“We have no certainty as yet as to how many Germans were among the victims,” he said, while Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her “sadness and shock” at the tragedy.
Authorities confirmed all 29 people killed were German — 18 women and 11 men.
“I have no words to describe what happened. I cannot face the suffering of these people,” Sousa said.
All but one of the 29 victims died at the crash scene and, of the 28 passengers treated for injuries, four remained in a critical condition yesterday.
The 29 victims were members of a bigger holiday group, of whom other members were travelling on another bus, a regional civil protection spokesman said.
Two of the injured were Portuguese and the rest were foreign nationals, the hospital spokesman said. Patients were being treated for head, abdominal and chest injuries.
A similar crash on the island in 2005 killed five Italian tourists.
“I think with sadness and shock of our compatriots and everybody else who was affected by the dreadful bus accident on Madeira,” Merkel said in a Twitter statement.
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