Bus crash tragedy in Italy – Survivors returning to Hungary

Budapest, January 22 (MTI) – All but two of the survivors of a bus crash that took the lives of 16 Hungarians in Italy could return home by Sunday evening, Human Resources Minister Zoltán Balog said at a press conference a little after noon.

The bus, which was transporting students and teachers of the Szinyei Merse Pál Secondary School in Budapest, as well as family members, hit the pillar of an overpass on the Venice-Verona motorway and caught fire just before midnight on Friday. The group was returning home from a ski trip.

Gábor Csató, the director of the National Ambulance Service, said four of the seriously injured passengers are returning to Hungary by air and two by ambulance.

He said 56 people were on the bus when it crashed: 43 students and thirteen adults, including the two bus drivers. Among the 16 dead are eleven students and five adults, he added.

The two people most seriously injured in the crash have still not been positively identified and are remaining in hospital in Italy, he said.

Csató said he had spoken with the injured and noted that most could not remember the accident.