site.btaDay of Mourning in Bulgaria after Bus Crash Leaves 17 Dead, Driver Is Charged

106 POLITICS - DAY OF MOURNING - BUS CRASH amplified 3

Day of Mourning in Bulgaria after
Bus Crash Leaves
17 Dead, Driver Is Charged


Sofia, August 27 (BTA) - Monday is a day of mourning in Bulgaria
after a bus crash near Svoge, some 40 km north of Sofia, on
August 25 left 17 dead and 20 injured. Flags outside state
institutions are raised at half-mast.

The prosecution service said it has pressed charged against the
driver, Grigor Grigorov, for manslaughter and causing the death
of 17 people. He is in remand on a 72-hour warrant but remains
in hospital to be treated for serious injuries.

Grigorov is charged with speeding: the limit was 40 kmph in this section of the road and he was going at 53 kmph when the bus
crashed.

The bus company and the quality of repairs that were last done
on the road where the crash occurred, are also being probed.

Three more passengers from the bus are still in life danger,
said Sofia's Pirogov emergency hospital. Two of them remain in
intensive care and the third is in a neurosurgery ward.

Churches across Sofia Region are holding services for the
victims of the bus crash.

The vast majority of passengers in the deadly bus were seniors
returning from a trip to a monastery.

The National Social Security Institute (NSSI) said it will offer
consultancy to the families of the victims with regard to
pensions and other issues within the competence of the NSSI. It
is sending a team of experts to visit the village of
Svotovrachane, which is where most of the victims lived.

Hristo Radkov of the Bulgarian Association of Drivers said
everybody seems to be preoccupied with putting the blame on
somebody rather finding the real causes and taking action to
prevent such things from happening. He blames the accident on "a
host of mistakes". He admits that the driver may be to blame
for failing to keep control on the bus. The weather was very bad
at the time but the key cause is the quality of the road, he
said.

Prime Minister Boyko Borissov cancelled a trip to Albania to be
in Sofia for the day of mourning.

Russian Patriarch Kirill has cabled condolences to the relatives of the victims of the crash. In the cable, addressed to his Bulgarian counterpart Neophyte, Patriarch Kirill offers the condolences of the Russian clergy, monks, and the entire Russian Orthodox church. RY/LN, ZH//