19 dead, 65 injured in Hong Kong double-decker bus crash

Nineteen are dead and sixty-five injured after a bus crash in Hong Kong on Saturday night. Bound for Tai Po from Sha Tin racecourse, the Kowloon Motor Bus (KMB) double-decker reportedly turned over on its side while rounding a corner.

Authorities detained the 30-year-old driver and charged him with dangerous driving causing death and dangerous driving causing grievous bodily harm, according to a police press release.

Though the cause of the accident was not immediately clear, one passenger told the South China Morning Post that the driver was “grumpy because some people criticized him for being late. He then started to drive the bus like he was flying a plane.” Another passenger who regularly takes the route called it “the fastest it had ever been” and estimated that the bus was going between 80 and 100km/h, well above the 70km/h speed limit on Tai Po Road.

The South China Morning Post reported that the driver was involved in a separate double-decker accident in 2014, for which he was fined HK $900 and lost points on his license for careless driving.

Wong Yu-Loi, a representative of the local bus union, ascribed blame to the negligence of government officials for failing to fulfill their promise to review guidelines regulating bus captain working conditions after a crash by a driver who had worked consecutive 13-hour days killed three last September. The union has long advocated for higher pay and a reduction in the working time limit for bus drivers, many of whom supplement their relatively low base wages with considerable overtime. A 2016 survey by the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions found that 78 percent of bus drivers work between 50 and 60 hours per week.

KMB claimed that the driver was familiar with the assigned route, having last driven it in mid-January, and was scheduled to work only a four-hour shift on Saturday after working 28 hours the previous four days, ostensibly ruling out inexperience or sleep deprivation as potential factors in the crash.

Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam pledged Saturday night to open an independent inquiry into the crash, “led by a judge, to make sure that Hong Kong’s public transport system — especially public buses — can become safe and reliable.”

According to the Hong Kong Free Press, KMB will pay HK $80,000 to each of the surviving victims and the families of the deceased. Of those injured in the crash, 32 were hospitalized in either serious or critical condition.

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[Images via HKFP]

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