The key facts
- At least 22 killed: 17 died at the scene, five more died in hospital
- There were 45 people on the bus, returning from a funeral
- The stretch of highway is officially listed as accident-prone; three weeks ago 17 more people died there
Head-on collision on the Nairobi–Mombasa highway
At least 22 people were killed when a passenger bus collided head-on with a truck in Kenya. The crash occurred on the morning of October 25, at around seven o'clock, in the Kanga area near the settlement of Mtito Andei, on the highway connecting Nairobi and Mombasa. According to preliminary reports, the passengers were returning from a funeral, the Associated Press reports. There were 45 people on the bus.
Version of events and the death toll
According to the preliminary version announced by Makueni County Commissioner Abdullahi Khalif, the bus driver was trying to overtake several vehicles and then collided with an oncoming truck. The final causes of the accident are being established. After the collision, emergency services arrived at the scene, and the injured were taken to nearby hospitals.
Casualties and the dangerous stretch
A local health official clarified that 17 people died at the scene, and five more died from their injuries in hospital. Several of the injured continue to receive medical care, and authorities do not rule out that the death toll may rise. The stretch of highway where the crash occurred has long been considered dangerous: Kenya's National Transport and Safety Authority previously included it in its list of high-accident locations and recommended additional measures. Just three weeks ago, another major crash on this same highway claimed the lives of 17 people.
Context
Earlier, Life.ru reported on a fatal crash involving a minibus and a truck in the Tyumen region: on October 22, on the Tyumen–Khanty-Mansiysk highway, a minibus rammed a lorry stopped at a traffic light; seven people were killed and two were hospitalized. The editorial team notes that the Kenyan crash occurred on a stretch that the country's own transport authorities had previously recognized as accident-prone — yet, according to available information, the recommended additional measures failed to prevent what is already the second mass casualty crash on this highway in the past three weeks.
