Two-year-old child and five teenagers among 17 k!lled after school bus crash in Peru

Seventeen people including a two-year-old child have been k!lled after a bus full of students, teachers, and parents plunged more than 20 meters off a cliffside road.

The students had been on a school trip before the vehicle – which carried 57 people – collided head-on with a van and veered off the road and into a ravine in Peru, according to the state government.

Jorge Sanchez, director of the regional directorate of San Martin said earlier:  ‘We have 11 deceased as a result of the accident.

‘Among them, there are five 17-year-old schoolchildren and a two-year-old child.’ 

Authorities have since revised the de@th toll to 17. 

‘The bus, which fell in a ravine more than 20 meters (65 feet) deep… left 17 dead and several people injured,’ the state government said in an update. 

The bus was carrying a group of schoolchildren, their families and teachers from the town of Piura, in the country’s north, to the Amazonian department of San Martin.

It crashed while driving along a road in the province of Moyobamba, in the San Marin region.

According to local media, the crash occurred while the high school students were on a class trip.

The Andean country has a high incidence of bus accidents, with 3,138 de@ths recorded in traffic accidents in 2023, according to the Ministry of Transport and Communications.