Thai police arrest driver of school bus fire that killed 23 - UPDATED
The bodies of 23 people have been recovered following a tragic bus accident involving school children outside Bangkok.
Thai police have arrested the driver of a bus carrying young students and teachers that caught fire and killed 23 in suburban Bangkok, as families arrived in the capital on Wednesday to help identify their loved ones, News.Az reports, citing The Herald .The bus carrying six teachers and 39 students in elementary and junior high school was travelling from Uthai Thani province, about 300 kilometres (186 miles) north of Bangkok, for a school trip in Ayutthaya and Nonthaburi provinces on Tuesday.
The fire started while the bus was on a highway north of the capital and spread so quickly many were unable to escape.
Trairong Phiwpan, head of the police forensic department, said 23 bodies were recovered from the bus.
The recovery work and confirmation of the total dead had been delayed earlier because the burned vehicle, which was fuelled with natural gas, remained too hot to enter for hours.
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The bus was returning to the Thai capital after a school trip to the north of the country. The vast majority of victims are believed to be children, News.Az reports, citing foreign media.
Videos from the scene showed flames engulfing the bus as it burned under an overpass, with huge clouds of dense black smoke billowing into the sky.
Transport Minister Suriyahe Juangroongruangkit said the bus was powered by "extremely risky" compressed natural gas.
Witnesses say the bus crashed into the concrete barrier dividing the highway just north of Bangkok, after a front tyre burst.
The bus was quickly consumed by an intense fire, and many on board were unable to get out. The cause of the fire is still unknown.
Nineteen children and three teachers are reported to have survived, sixteen of whom are being treated in hospital for their injuries.
The driver has fled the site of the crash but authorities are confident he will be tracked down, according to Thailand's Interior Minister Anutin Charnvirakul.
The ages of the children on board remains unclear, but the school caters for pupils between three and 15 years old.
Thailand has one of the worst road safety records in the world, with unsafe vehicles and poor driving contributing to roughly 20,000 fatalities a year.
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A bus carrying dozens of primary school children has crashed and caught fire just outside Bangkok, Thailand.
Sixteen children and three teachers are reported to have escaped, but 22 pupils and three teachers are still unaccounted for, according to the country's transport minister, News.Az reports, citing BBC.
Officials say they have found ten bodies on the bus.
Photographs show the bus completely destroyed by the fire. Investigators are said to have been unable to enter the vehicle because of the heat, according to local media.
The bus was one of three, carrying children and teachers returning from a school field trip in the northern province of Uthai Thani.
Transport Minister Suriyahe Juangroongruangkit said the bus was powered by compressed natural gas.
“This is a very tragic incident,” Mr Suriyahe told reporters at the scene.
“The ministry must find a measure… if possible, for passenger vehicles like this to be banned from using this type of fuel because it’s extremely risky,” he added.
Thailand's prime minister, meanwhile, has ordered ministers to visit the scene.
"As a mother, I would like to express my deepest regrets to the families of those killed," Paetongtarn Shinawatra said.
"The government will be responsible for all the medical costs and the compensation for those killed," she added.
#Schoolbus catches fire in #Thailand, killing 25.
— News.Az (@news_az) October 1, 2024
A school bus carrying more than 40 students and teachers on an excursion caught fire on the outskirts of Bangkok, Thailand. pic.twitter.com/OROv3t4ppO
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