adminTendai Gutikwa and Tinashe Hazvide
At least 20 people were injured, while four cattle were killed opposite Christmas Pass BP Shell Filling Station last Thursday when an ISUZU lorry carrying 15 cattle, which was travelling from Chinhoyi en route to Chipinge, lost balance after both its front tyres burst, veered off the road and crashed into a Trip Trans Yutong bus carrying 67 passengers.
The bus was travelling from Harare to Mutare.
Manicaland Provincial Police spokesperson Inspector Enock Chishiri said the Trip Trans bus (Reg No. ADC 4811) pulled off the road to drop off passengers on the bus stop opposite Christmas Pass BP Shell Filling Station.
“The driver of the ISUZU lorry (Reg No. ACD 0525), which was travelling in the same direction, Arnold Taguta (27,) lost control of the truck and rammed into the rear right side of the bus.
“Twenty people sustained minor injuries, which have since been dealt with. Investigations are still in progress to establish what really caused the driver to lose control of his vehicle,” said Insp Chishiri.
The lorry, which belongs to Noah Taguta, the leader of the Johanne Marange Apostolic Church, lost its windscreen and all four tyres due to the accident while the supporting steel bars which housed the beasts were heavily disjointed.
Trip Trans bus’s rear right side corner was extensively damaged.
Eyewitnesses, however, had another story to tell, saying that the lorry driver, Taguta, lost control of the vehicle because the two front tyres had burst and he was trying to evade a heavily loaded truck which was going in the opposite direction.
“I was sitting on the back seat in the bus and I saw everything. We were parked opposite the service station when that lorry’s tyres burst, and the lorry was about 100 metres away from the bus.
“We all saw the driver trying hard to control his vehicle so that he would not run into the heavy truck which was coming from town and that is when he hit us,” said Tichaona Nyamukapa, who was a passenger in the Trip Trans bus.
Eleven cattle were badly injured, with many of them sustaining broken legs.
Officials from the SPCA were forced to put down one of the seriously injured beasts.
“We did all we can to save these animals’ lives but unfortunately some were already beyond saving.
“We also had to put down one of them since it was clear that it was struggling for dear life and having trouble breathing.
“So as we put it down, we made sure that we were not contravening the Animals Anti-Cruelty Act,” stated Lynne James from the SPCA as she and her crew helped feed the surviving animals.
However, there was some drama at the accident scene as some members of the public wanted free for all beef and would not wait to pull out their knives in readiness to skin the dead beasts.
One unidentified man could simply not resist the temptation to collect fresh blood from one of the killed beasts. Where on earth he found a pot, no one knew.
The injured passengers, who were ferried to Mutare Provincial Hospital, have since been discharged.
Online Reporter