Swiss death-crash bus: driver charged

A driver of a coach from Switzerland that crashed in central Norway, killing three and leaving one seriously injured, has been charged for careless driving on Tuesday.
The Swiss company Eurobus has confirmed one of their mini-buses carrying a group of Swiss tourists was involved in an incident on the E18 in central Norway.
Paul Georg Skogen, acting head of emergency at Namsos hospital, said to NTB: “Three persons are dead, and one patient is at St. Olaf Hospital in Trondheim, critically injured. The thirteen now at the hospital in Namsos are uninjured or lightly injured.”
Namsos hospital is on a crisis alert and has called in all available resources. The Consulate of Switzerland are helping contact next of kin.
Switzerland's ambassador to Norway, Rudolf Knoblauch, says to NTB: “I'm amazed by how quickly the emergency departments have reacted. At the same time this is a very sad case for the involved people and their next-to-kin.”
Arnt Skau and his wife were on a driving holiday and were driving among traffic behind the bus. Arnt said to newspaper “Trønder-Avisa”: "The bus veered violently before the accident happened. It passed the middle of the road several times before it suddenly went out into the ditch.”
"Many were seriously injured and were lying around on the scene. Several people arrived at the scene started to cry while they sat among those who were injured or dead."
In total 17 people were on board. The passengers were mostly elderly people. The bus driver is supposedly among the 13 who are sent to the hospital in Namsos.
The bus is reported to have veered off the road and crashed into a mountainside. The cause of the incident is unknown at this stage, but it is believed the quality of the road surface may have been a factor that caused the accident.
Representatives from the Accident Investigation Board Norway arrived at the scene of the accident and began an investigation on Tuesday.
Photo: Terje Næss / NTB scanpix
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