Children among 21 dead after Venice tourist bus plunges from bridge

Authorities are investigating if the driver fell ill before the crash, which also injured more than a dozen people

Italian authorities are investigating whether the driver of a bus that plummeted 50ft (15 metres) from an elevated road in Venice, killing 21 people and injuring at least 15, had fallen ill before the crash.

Among the people who died in the Tuesday night crash included the Italian driver, at least five Ukrainians and one German citizen, according to the Venice prefecture.

Regional governor Luca Zaia said that the dynamic of the accident remained hard to decipher. “Everything makes one think of an illness,” Mr Zaia said. “The driver was an expert, a good person, very well referenced.”

At least two of the dead were children, Venice prefect Michele Di Bari said, adding that many of the people involved in the accident were “young”. Nine people were in critical condition, including a three-year-old girl from Ukraine.

The Venice prosecutor Bruno Cherchi said he was proceeding with a multiple road homicide investigation into the bus crash. Speaking at a press conference, Mr Cherchi said an autopsy on the driver’s body would be important for the case.

Firefighters worked until dawn to clear the wreckage. Later on Wednesday morning, traffic was slowly passing the spot where the bus burst through a guardrail and a rusted fence.

The wake of the crash on Tuesday evening (Slow Press/LiveMedia/LaPresse)

The bus was carrying foreign tourists from Venice’s Piazzale Roma to the Hu campground on Tuesday evening when it fell from an elevated street next to railway tracks in the borough of Mestre, catching fire. Tourists frequently stay in boroughs across the lagoon from the canals of Venice's famous historic centre to find cheaper accommodations.

The injured included French, Spanish, Austrian and Croatian nationals, local officials said. The Spanish Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday that two people from Spain were injured in the accident, and both were in hospital and in good condition.

The French Foreign Ministry confirmed that there was a French national among the injured. Hospital psychologists were working to help the victims deal with the trauma.

Rescuers noted that the fact that the bus was electric contributed to the massive fire and made rescue operations more difficult.

Godstime Erheneden said he was in his apartment near the site when he heard the crash. He rushed outside and was among the first to enter the bus.

“When we went in, we saw the driver right away. He was dead. I carried a woman out on my shoulders, then a man,” Mr Erheneden told the local newspaper il Gazzettino.

“The woman was screaming, ‘my daughter, my daughter,’ and I went back in. I saw this girl who must have been two years old. I have a son who is a year and 10 months old, and they are the same size. I felt like I was holding my son in my arms. It was terrible. I don’t know if she survived. I thought she was alive but when the rescuers arrived, they took her away immediately,” Mr Erheneden said.

Venice Mayor Luigi Brugnaro wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the scene was “apocalyptic” and declared a state of mourning.

In 2017, 16 people on a bus carrying Hungarian students died in an accident near the northern city of Verona. In 2013, 40 people were killed in one of Italy’s worst vehicle accidents when a bus plunged off a viaduct close to the southern city of Avellino.

Associated Press