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24 dead in Israel desert bus crash
3 hours ago
UVDA, Israel (AFP) — Twenty-four people were killed and 33 hurt when a bus carrying visiting Russian travel agents plunged into a ravine from a notoriously dangerous road in Israel's Negev desert on Tuesday, rescuers said.
Among the injured, 23 were in a serious condition, the Magen David Adom rescue service said.
"The bodies of the passengers were hurled from the bus as it crashed down into the ravine," said a taxi driver who was travelling behind the bus.
"The driver of the bus tried to overtake another bus in a hairpin curve and lost control of his vehicle," he told Israeli public radio.
Army radio said the driver survived the crash but was in shock and unable to say what happened. It added that he had previously been cited with 22 traffic violations.
Local media said the passengers were among 150 Russian travel agents who had just arrived to survey the Red Sea resort of Eilat, which is bracing for an invasion of tourists seeking to get away from the harsh winter at home.
The travel agents were aboard two buses going from from Uvda airport to Eilat, 50 kilometres (30 miles) away. Those on the ill-fated bus had flown in from Saint Petersburg.
Local media said the bus flipped over several times as it plunged down 13 metres (45 feet) on to a dry river bed in the Negev, a rocky desert that covers more than half of Israel's land mass.
"The sight was horrible," said Michel Elkaslasy, the owner of the company that rented out the bus. "The bus is upside-down at the end of nowhere," he told the YNet online news service.
A highway safety official told public radio that 10 accidents had occurred on the same stretch of road over the past seven years, some resulting in fatalities.
Air force helicopters and ambulances rushed the casualties to a hospital in Eilat, which received reinforcements from doctors and nurses attending a medical congress in Israel's southernmost city.
The health ministry ordered all medical personnel in Eilat to report to the hospital in order to help the casualties.
Those with serious injuries were transferred to other cities that have larger hospitals, while the bodies of the dead were being flown to Tel Aviv for identification.
Two Russian planes are to due leave for Israel to bring psychological and medical assistance for the victims and also take loved ones of the dead and injured to the scene of the tragedy, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.
At the same time, the Israeli tourism ministry has set up a crisis centre manned with a Russian speaker to take calls from anxious relatives.
"It was an information gathering voyage for five tour operators from Saint Petersburg," a spokeswoman for the Russian travel industry union, Irina Tiurina, told the RIA Novosti agency.
Eilat has become increasingly popular with Russians flying in on charter flights in search of winter sun and who now benefit from a visa-free regime between the two countries.
3 hours ago
UVDA, Israel (AFP) — Twenty-four people were killed and 33 hurt when a bus carrying visiting Russian travel agents plunged into a ravine from a notoriously dangerous road in Israel's Negev desert on Tuesday, rescuers said.
Among the injured, 23 were in a serious condition, the Magen David Adom rescue service said.
"The bodies of the passengers were hurled from the bus as it crashed down into the ravine," said a taxi driver who was travelling behind the bus.
"The driver of the bus tried to overtake another bus in a hairpin curve and lost control of his vehicle," he told Israeli public radio.
Army radio said the driver survived the crash but was in shock and unable to say what happened. It added that he had previously been cited with 22 traffic violations.
Local media said the passengers were among 150 Russian travel agents who had just arrived to survey the Red Sea resort of Eilat, which is bracing for an invasion of tourists seeking to get away from the harsh winter at home.
The travel agents were aboard two buses going from from Uvda airport to Eilat, 50 kilometres (30 miles) away. Those on the ill-fated bus had flown in from Saint Petersburg.
Local media said the bus flipped over several times as it plunged down 13 metres (45 feet) on to a dry river bed in the Negev, a rocky desert that covers more than half of Israel's land mass.
"The sight was horrible," said Michel Elkaslasy, the owner of the company that rented out the bus. "The bus is upside-down at the end of nowhere," he told the YNet online news service.
A highway safety official told public radio that 10 accidents had occurred on the same stretch of road over the past seven years, some resulting in fatalities.
Air force helicopters and ambulances rushed the casualties to a hospital in Eilat, which received reinforcements from doctors and nurses attending a medical congress in Israel's southernmost city.
The health ministry ordered all medical personnel in Eilat to report to the hospital in order to help the casualties.
Those with serious injuries were transferred to other cities that have larger hospitals, while the bodies of the dead were being flown to Tel Aviv for identification.
Two Russian planes are to due leave for Israel to bring psychological and medical assistance for the victims and also take loved ones of the dead and injured to the scene of the tragedy, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.
At the same time, the Israeli tourism ministry has set up a crisis centre manned with a Russian speaker to take calls from anxious relatives.
"It was an information gathering voyage for five tour operators from Saint Petersburg," a spokeswoman for the Russian travel industry union, Irina Tiurina, told the RIA Novosti agency.
Eilat has become increasingly popular with Russians flying in on charter flights in search of winter sun and who now benefit from a visa-free regime between the two countries.
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