Brazil: 41 dead in bus accident – laparenthese-gourmande

Authorities on Sunday raised the death toll to 41 in a weekend bus accident in the southeast of the country. Brazil which President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva described as a “terrible tragedy”.

That toll is up from the 38 deaths announced after Saturday’s crash, when federal highway police called it the worst accident on the country’s highways since 2007.

Civil police told reporters on Sunday that “41 bodies” had been removed from the accident site near the mining town of Teofilo Otoni, in Minas Gerais state.

A damaged car is crushed under a vehicle following a road accident after a crowded bus collided with a truck on Brazil’s Fernao Dias national road. Photo: via Reuters

The bus was heading from Sao Paulo, in the southeast, to the northeastern state of Bahia when, according to federal police, a large block of granite apparently fell from a truck traveling in the opposite direction and hit the bus.

The bus then caught fire in the ensuing wreck.

It took rescuers hours to extinguish the flames, clear the rubble and evacuate all the victims.

The dead included the bus driver and at least one child, authorities said.