South Africa Bus Crash Kills 17 School Children

At least 17 school children have been killed when the minibus they were travelling in crashed into a truck and exploded into a ball of fire on Friday.

The incident occurred in Mpumalanga province, east of the capital Pretoria, on Friday according to emergency services.

“The number now is at least 17 fatalities,” Russel Meiring, ER24 spokesman said.

About 20 children were in the minibus when it collided with the truck, he said.

In a statement, emergency medical service ER24 described arriving at the scene, where firefighters were tackling the flames. A number of children had already been pulled out by “members of the community”, the statement said.

“Once the flames had been extinguished, paramedics found that approximately 13 children [were] lying trapped inside the vehicle. Unfortunately, nothing could be done for the children and they were declared dead on the scene,” the statement added.