Coach crash kills one and injures dozens
- 00:01:34
- ITN
Coach crash kills one and injures dozens
One man died and three people are critically ill after a coach carrying 70 passengers plunged down a steep embankment. The man, a 26-year-old from Poland, was pronounced dead at the scene of the crash in Alton, Staffordshire, close to the Alton Towers theme park. Twenty-one people were taken to local hospitals in Stoke-on-Trent, Stafford, Burton and Selly Oak, Birmingham, and dozens more sustained minor injuries. Two of the injured were airlifted to hospital and paramedics treated "walking wounded" at the medical centre at Alton Towers. The single-decker coach, from Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, was travelling from Alton Towers theme park towards Alton village, along Station Road, when it crashed shortly before 6pm on Monday night. It collided with two stationary vehicles and smashed through a wall before plunging ten to 15 feet down an embankment, Staffordshire Police said. It eventually came to a stop on its side, in a resident's garden. Residents described hearing a crash like a thunder clap, before screams and shouts. Margaret Grice, who lives near the crash scene, opened her door and found "12 or 15 young people standing there, crying and with blood running down them". Murray MacGregor, spokesman for West Midlands Ambulance Service, said the coach driver, a man from Lincolnshire, was seriously injured. He said the coach had come from Peterborough, carrying passengers from Lithuania, South Africa and Poland. It is thought they were farm workers who had spent the day at Alton Towers. The woman whose garden the coach crashed into said: "It just sounded like a clap of thunder." Terri Peachey added: "I saw the coach flying through the garden and just dialled 999." She said she grabbed towels and took them out to help the injured who she said were bleeding, crying and lying on the floor. Chief Inspector John Maddox of Staffordshire Police said officers were trying to establish what caused the crash. He said the coach was thought to have come down a steep hill, towards a bend, before clipping parked vehicles and going off the road.
ITN | August 19, 2008
