15 killed, 30 injured, completed as a crowded bus in Sri Lanka from the cliff

An overcrowded bus with dozens of Buddhist pilgrims fell against an abyss in Sri Lanka on Sunday, killed 15 and injured at least 30, the local police said.

Under the worst street accidents in the country for decades, the state bus drove through the central hilly region of Kotmalale when the driver lost control and rejected a cliff road before dawn, the police said.

It wore around 70 passengers – about 20 more than their capacity – and added that an examination was underway.

“We try to determine whether it was a mechanical mistake or whether the driver fell asleep at the wheel,” a local police officer told AFP by phone.

“Fifteen people died and we sent 30 to the hospital,” added the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The bus drove from the pilgrimage city of Kataragama in the deep south of the island to downtown Kurunegala, a distance of about 250 kilometers (155 miles).

Sri Lanka records an average of 3,000 street notes annually and make the streets of the island the most dangerous in the world.

The bus accident on Sunday was one of the worst in Sri Lanka since April 2005 when a driver tried to hit a train in a current crossing in the city of Polgahawela. The bus driver escaped with minor injuries, but 37 passengers were killed.

In March 2021, 13 passengers and the driver of a private bus died when the vehicle fell on Sunday around 100 kilometers east of the accident site in an abyss in Passara.

(With the exception of the heading, this story was not edited by NDTV employees and is published from a syndicated feed.)