“Otherwise, he would tip into the void”: a former firefighter who was driving behind the damaged bus in Porte-Puymorens testifies

A few hours after the accident, the coach was evacuated with the left front completely destroyed, as well as almost all of its windows broken, as seen in the images from the TF1 1 p.m. report above. It was 5 p.m. on Sunday when this vehicle carrying 47 people crashed violently into a cliff above the village of Porté-Puymorens, in the Pyrénées-Orientales. “JI heard a big crash of stones and scrap metal, it was a little confusing because it was huge“, assures a local resident in front of our camera.

Why such an accident on this national road? Our team on site was able to meet a former firefighter, Laurent. He was driving right behind the bus. “IThere was a big cloud of dust on the left side, so I understood that there was a problem with the brakes and that the driver was trying by all means to stophe assures. And then he chose the only suitable place to stop for good. He chose it, and therefore it was a deliberate act on the part of the driver to stop at that place, otherwise he would tip into the void.” A hypothesis which remains to be confirmed, because the investigation has only just started.

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This Spanish bus had just left Andorra to return to Barcelona after a day trip. The driver had just crossed a pass at an altitude of 1900 meters. “He yelled at people to hold on and get on the opposite side of the impact he anticipatedcontinues Laurent. So for me, yes, he is a real, a real hero. He really did everything to save people.”

Mechanical problems, human error? Our team was able to go to the accident site. “Looked at these guardrails several tens of meters before the accident site. These traces show that the bus hit the safety barrier several times and in several places.“, shows our special correspondent Perrine Mislanghe.

The local residents are also trying to understand, because this accident surprises the inhabitants of this village of around a hundred souls. “It is a mountain road which is wide enough, which is very passable, with places where there can be narrowings, turns which are a little tighter than others…“, comments one of them. This road remains closed until further notice. As for the injured, the majority of them were taken care of in Spain.