8 killed in Batangas, QC bus accidents
BATANGAS CITY—At least six people were killed while more than 50 others were hurt when a bus, which was carrying teachers and school officials from Rizal province, rammed into a tree in Mataas na Kahoy town in Batangas province on Friday, police said.
The accident, involving Gurim Travel and Tours Corp., happened shortly following a road crash in Quezon City that killed two people, including a pregnant woman, and injured 11 others after a bus sideswiped a passenger van at the corner of Commonwealth Avenue in Novaliches.
Senior Insp. Daniel de la Cruz, Mataas na Kahoy police chief, said the tourist bus was ferrying at least 59 people, most of them teachers in Angono town in Rizal, when they figured in the accident at 8:30 a.m.
They were on their way to the Shercon Resort in Mataas na Kahoy for an outing, he said.
The bus was traversing the provincial road in Barangay San Sebastian when the driver, Christopher Plando, warned his passengers that he had lost control of the vehicle after its brakes failed.
“Palusong yung daan (The road was downhill). One of the survivors said the driver screamed to warn them that the bus had lost its brakes,” De la Cruz said.
The vehicle hit a roadside tree and fell into a meter-deep canal.
Police identified the fatalities as Zenaida Bautista, Grace Replan, Sabeniano Virgina, Karina Untalan, Evangeline Sibal and Christina
Cariman. The injured passengers were taken to hospitals in Lipa City in Batangas.
De la Cruz said he was uncertain if all the fatalities were teachers. “It was an outing. [The teachers and other school officials] could have brought their relatives,” he said.
De la Cruz said investigators were also checking if there were children on the bus.
As this developed, the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) preventively suspended nine units of Gurim Travel and Tours.
“The number of death and injuries caused by what we legally call reckless imprudence is already at an alarming rate,” said LTFRB board member Ariel Inton, who is pushing for heavier penalty for the crime.
The operator of the tourist bus company was given 72 hours from receipt of the suspension order to explain in writing why its franchise should not be canceled in view of the accident. The franchise covers the route from Bacoor, Cavite, to any point in Luzon.
Within the 30-day preventive suspension, the operator is also required to submit the nine vehicles to road worthiness inspection and have the drivers undergo road safety seminar and drug testing.
