17 people have died on the spot while 48 others sustained injuries and are admitted to Mumpashya and Katondwe Mission Hospitals respectively in an accident which happened on Great East Road.
Police spokesperson Esther Katongo has confirmed the sad development saying the accident happened between Luangwa Market and Luangwa Bridge at about 21 08 hours after the driver of the Scania bus registration number ABP 6303 belonging to Kapena Transport which was Eastern bound failed to negotiate a curve making the bus to overturn.
Among the dead are three juveniles, six male adults and eight female adults. The driver of the bus is among the 48 injured.
The bodies are being transported to the two above mentioned hospital mortuaries.
“We appeal to members of the public who could have relatives on the bus to travel to Luangwa to help in identifying the bodies of the deceased,” Mrs Katongo said.
Why do we keep going to and fro on banning night driving for buses carrying passengers?
Very sad, lives have been lost. Again we are joined together as one zambia in this tragedy.
Trying hard to beat time so as not to contravene the night ban and in the process overturns.
Do you blame the driver?
That PF should be shut down.
Travel burn
s-ques and crimp the bows (mapwazi) of the owner of the bus to death please,or charge him with treason like HH atase. why driving at that time.
please con-cedar my request ba ITC!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanx
NIGHT TIME DRIVING SHOULD NOT BE BANNED AS IT IS VERY COSTLY TO OUR ECONOMY.
ACCIDENTS WILL HAPPEN
MAY THEIR SOULS REST IN PEACE
This driver was overspeeding…i know this spot when we were going back and to boarding school…i remember bus drivers doing walking speed at this place.
Again down to the fake PSV liciences out there!!
E TERRORISM YABA KU ZAMBIA II- CARELESS UN PROPERLY QUALIFIED DRIVERS WHO GET DRIVING LICENSES THROUGH BRIBING THOSE WHO GIVE DRIVING LICENSES, BAD UN SIGNED ROADS, LACK OF DUAL CARRIAGE ROADS, NO STREET LAMPS ALONG CERTAIN DANGEROUS PARTS OF THE ROADS, ETC.
Some corrupt police allowed the bus to continue moving after 21:00HRS. Unless I am behind, I thought the government disallowed all passenger carrying buses to continue moving after 21:00HRS.
Why do you like to attack police when they can not defend themselves?
If they arrest you and charge with un-bailable charge then you start hallucinating that government is unfair?
Learn from HH, he has become a good boy I hear.
they are corrupt pfpolice cadres just like their master Jameson Chagwa Lungu…
Police are very corrupt to the core.They have no pride in being police officer.They are benig used by politician to
settl political score no wonder they don’t use their brains to think but their skulls.Don’t take the false calm prevailing as sign of surrender.In wrestling ,the wrestlers are told not to resist any blow so as to lessen the impact,so hope you get it.
RTSA is not taking road safety seriously – too reactive than proactive. A closer look at the wreckage which LT has not shown shows that this bus was not roadworthy – Tyres were completely finished. And yet you have a permanently stationed RTSA office at Intercity allowing buses to leave in that state? This is not acceptable! Let us show we care. All I can say is RTSA needs to be overhauled! Their performance so far is below par!
Your comments make lots of sense.
I hear GBM owns some buses as well, the question is are they travelling at night as well and in what condition are they?
go and ask GBM yourself and just know that you have to go by plain to india, we are not interested in that all we want is that the owner of the bus that has wrested 17 lives on the sport shod be killed or changed with treason.
Poor road markings and absent Cats’ eyes make it hard to drive on many roads in Zambia. I look forward to the day that RDA engineers will be dragged to courts for causing genocides on our roads through poor construction and project handling methods.
Do you have facts on the cause of accident?
They have been sacrificed.
And there’s a 24/7 police check point right at Luangwa Market! Fire all Officers responsible for allowing the bus to sneak past, and revoke the operator’s license.
This is barely a day after our discussing AG Kanganja-Pilatus corruption.
Charge the police officers for murder!!!!!!!
Very sad for our Nation Zambia: I am asking the Government to charge the owner of the Bus by asking him to offer food in all homes of the deceased. Then he should arrange for all burial cost of every family. Ba government mwiponenamo mwakula tumpika abama buses.
If only we had passenger trains then we would avoid such.The driver could have been speeding to avoid the night caphew
I’m sure the driver was rushing to sleep at Nyimba or Petauke. I don’t think this is a police officers fault bcoz the accident is reported to have happened before the bridge where there is a roadblock. Humanly speaking,the driver shud have known that it’s 21hrs and doesn t need RATSA to remind him. SUSPEND THE LICENSE OF KAPENA APENA!
This is diabolical.
Ban night driving of passenger carrying buses. Full stop.
Stop politics of arrogance and save people’s lives.
Very sad. My thoughts and prayers are with the families that have lost their loved ones.
We need to improve road safety in the public transport sector. RTSA you already have our submissions on this. Revocation of licenses when accident happen is not a solution.We won’t have any transporters if you go this route.
I agree with Brown Envelope..the driver should have been rushing to sleep in nyimba but still I wonder if the cops at luangwa bridge would have allowed him to proceed since it was past 21..
@Brown Envelope, we have ‘Paras’ at Luangwa bridge and Khaki Police at the boom at the market, right there at the bus stop.
ques the bows (mapwazi) of the owner of the bus to death please,or charge him with treason like HH atase. why driving at that time.
please con-cedar my request ba ITC!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanx
I’m left wondering? At what speed was the bus a accelerating just between the market and the bridge for it to overturn like that?
John,
Very good observation. The two places are not that far from each other and i also wonder what was the rush?
17 Souls is a lot of souls to lose in one accident. This is 5 less than the number of lives lost from the Manchester Terrorist attack. Are bad driving, poor road construction and poor and corrupt practices related to road safety in Zambia to be equated with terrorism? Most certainly as lives are being lost in a callous manner in both instances. Sometop dog out there should be resigning over this. But No. Zambian lives Do Not Matter.
Failing to negotiate a corner!!! What sort of corner and what was his speed? I personally think the condition of the suspension played a role in this accident . Tight turns should be eliminated on highways to avoid these accidents of failing to negotiate a corner and curvy sections should have proper road signs and speed limits if anything put road hump (not those big ones to send a car flying but small enough not to cause damage to a car which passes at high speed but enough to prompt the driver to slow down).
Rtsa and road traffic dept should focus on inspecting public service vehicles at the bus intercity stations. Measures should be in place to make sure tyres, triangles,fire extinguisher, first aid boxes are in place as well as to see to it no bus leaves at night. Secondly bus conductors and drivers should be trained in emergency first aid as a requirement by law!
Agony is advising the Presido to convey message of condolences to UK and the UK does not reciprocate when you are also befallen with an adversity such as this one.
UK just knows that we are persecuting political opponents. But they now understand that road rage is treason in Zambia LOL
How can UK reciprocate when all they know is that Zambia is populated only by two individuals – Edgar and HH.
How many years have we rotten in jail over a ball of marijuana and UK has remained silent? You can die all you like and UK won’t butt an eyelid. What matters to them is the wellness of politicians. You and I are mere statistics to them.
No more wiser words have been spoken.
RDA is to blame for this. government spend alot of money for road construction and maintainance. but look at our roads, most of them are substandard.
poor road markings which makes it difficult to identify your correct lane when driving, no road signage. and the site where the accident happened from needs to have metal barricades at the side where the ditch for the river is.
and how do the police allow the driver to be moving past 21hrs since they are also saying this not the first time this company has been doing this….
Don’t blame the Police first blame the travelers because i for one stay in eastern province and whenever i am travelling back i don’t board i bus if i know it will not reach before 21:00 i avoid at all cost to travel. and suppose the police had no watch what then? or are they provided with watches by the Police admin? or maybe the driver said he will sleep at the market and suddenly he proceeded when he by passed the Police check point. Let us not always have a mentality of boma ilanganepo but lets be proactive as citizen. Never accept to be packed like oranges and hoping RTSA to pounce on the driver.
The driver was adjusting breaks throughout the journey.Meaning it had a problem with the breaks. RTSA should ground these ancient buses forever
All this, is PF government making without effective decision making ethos. How does PF wholesomely lift up the night ban driving of passenger busses without in-built safety measures. Which drivers went for re-training and what regulatory measures of night driving have been put in place?. PF government prides in deaths of innocent Zambians by focusing on money over human life.
MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTION (TRUE OR FALSE):
1. RTAs HAVE BECOME COMMON IN ZAMBIA?
2. SOMETIMES RTAs ARE CAUSED BY DANGEROUS DRIVING?
3. RTAs HAVE RESULTED IN DEATH IN ZAMBIA?
4. THUS DELIBERATELY CAUSING A TRAFFIC OFFENCE SHOULD NOT BE TREATED LIGHTLY AS A MERE SIMPLE TRAFFIC OFFENCE?
5. DELIBERATELY CAUSING RTA IS A TRAFFIC OFFENCE IN ZAMBIA?
6. DELIBERATELY IGNORING TO GIVE WAY TO THE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE IS A TRAFFIC OFFENCE?
7. LIKE OTHER TRAFFIC OFFENCES, DELIBERATELY IGNORING TO GIVE WAY TO THE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE CAN LEAD TO AN RTA INVOLVING THE PRESIDENT?
8. THEREFORE, DELIBERATELY IGNORING TO GIVE WAY TO THE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE CAN LEAD TO DEATH OF THE PRESIDENT IN AN RTA?
9. THUS WHOEVER DELIBERATELY IGNORES TO GIVE WAY TO THE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE IS COURTING…
-continued-
9. THUS WHOEVER DELIBERATELY IGNORES TO GIVE WAY TO THE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE IS COURTING AN RTA WHICH CAN LEAD TO DEATH AND ONE OF THE CASUALTIES CAN BE THE PRESIDENT?
10. IT IS THEREFORE RIGHT, FAIR, LEGALLY TENABLE TO TRY SUCH A ONE FOR POSSIBLE PARA-SUICIDE, SUICIDE, MURDER OR TREASON?
LET THE LEGAL MINDS ANALYZE THE QUESTIONS AND RESPONSES.
I REST MY CASE
– limit speed of busses and trucks to 80 km/ hr by a speed limiter.
– check if the driver rests for at laest 15 minutes after driving 2 hours.
– limit working hours for the driver to 8 hours per day.
– have 2 drivers in each bus for travels longer than 8 hours.
– safety check all busses when the bus leaves the bus station, at the start of the journey.
That will help to prevent these terrible accidents.