BY Ian Dunn | October 27 | 
0 COMMENTS 
print
Holy Father sends letter of condolence to victims of French bus crash that killed at least 43 people
Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, has sent a telegram of condolence in the Pope’s name following a French bus crash that killed at least 43 people.
“Pope Francis joins in prayer in the suffering of the bereaved families, and commends the victims to God’s mercy so that He may welcome them in His light,” Cardinal Parolin (above) writes. “He expresses his spiritual closeness to the injured and to the families of those involved, and to the rescue services. As a pledge of consolation the Holy Father offers his special apostolic blessing to all those affected by the tragedy.”
In total 41 people on a bus carrying elderly day-trippers were killed early last Friday when the bus hit a truck head-on and caught fire, in France’s worst road crash in more than 30 years. Two people, including a young boy, died in the truck. A total of eight people were injured.
The bus and the truck collided near a forested bend on a two-lane road cut into a hillside near Puisseguin in the Gironde region, about 35 miles east of Bordeaux, the local prefect’s office said in a statement
TV footage showed two blackened vehicles, with the bus facing the wood-transporter’s trailer, the truck’s cab skewed to one side, and scorched vegetation around the site, which was sealed off by police.
The bus was carrying about 50 pensioners south to the Bearn region from their homes in the village of Petit Palais and surrounding hamlets. The crash occurred just a few minutes after the pensioners had boarded the bus.
Among the dead were the driver of the articulated lorry and a young boy who was in the cab, according to the local prefect’s office. News reports said the child was about three years old.
The driver of the bus was among the survivors, who were able to exit through the front door he opened, according to a source close to an inquiry that was under way within hours.
RSS Feeds