The 2013 Valdresekspressen hijacking was a hijacking of an express bus running on the Nor-Way Bussekspress Valdresekspressen (

Valdres Valdres () is a traditional district in central, southern Norway, situated between the districts of Gudbrandsdalen and Hallingdal. The region of Valdres consists of the six municipalities of Nord-Aurdal, Sør-Aurdal, Øystre Slidre, Vestre Slidre ...

Express) route, which took place east of

Øvre Årdal Øvre Årdal is a village in Årdal Municipality in Vestland county, Norway. It is the larger of the two primary villages in Årdal. The village is situated at the northern end of the long lake Årdalsvatnet, with the village of Årdalstangen at ...

on 4 November 2013. The driver and both passengers were killed.

Events

The bus was travelling on Nor-Way Bussekspress' long-distance Valdresekspressen route between

Årdalstangen Årdalstangen is the administrative centre of Årdal Municipality in Vestland county, Norway. The village is one of the two main population centers in the municipality, along with the village of Øvre Årdal. The village has a population (2019) ...

and

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

Route 160
Selskapene bak NOR-WAY Bussekspress AS
when it was hijacked at about 5.30 pm on Fylkesvei 53 between Øvre Årdal, a village in the municipality of

Årdal Årdal is a municipality in Vestland county, Norway. It is located at the end of the Årdalsfjorden in the traditional district of Sogn. The village of Årdalstangen is the administrative center of the municipality. The other main village is Ø ...

Vestland Vestland is a county in Norway established on 1 January 2020. The county is located in Western Norway and it is centred around the city of Bergen, Norway's second largest city. The administrative centre of the county is the city of Bergen, where t ...

county, and

Tyin Tyin is a lake in Vang Municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. The lake is located in the southwest part of the Jotunheimen mountain range. The lake lies in Vang Municipality in Innlandet county, but a small portion of the lake extends into År ...

in the neighbouring municipality of Vang in Innlandet county.Lars Barth-Heyerdahl
"Tre drept i busskapring"
,

TV2 Channel 2 or TV 2 may refer to: Television networks, channels and stations *Channel 2 (Iran), operated by Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting *Channel 2 (Israel), a commercial television station *, entertainment and music television in Latvia * ...

, 4 November 2013, updated 5 November 2013 The driver and both passengers were killed with a knife. The suspect gave himself up voluntarily; he had self-inflicted knife wounds and was taken to a hospital.Oda Leraan Skjetne
"Politiet måtte kjøre 89 kilometer for å komme fram til bussen"
''

Dagbladet ''Dagbladet'' (lit.: ''The Daily Magazine'') is one of Norway's largest newspapers and is published in the tabloid format. It has 1,400,000 daily readers on mobile, web and paper. Traditionally ''Dagbladet'' is considered the main liberal newsp ...

'', 4 November 2013 Hannah Strange
"Three killed in Norway bus hijacking"
''

The Telegraph ''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include: Australia * ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...

'', 4 November 2013. Wrongly thinking a tunnel was closed, the police took over an hour to drive to the isolated location;Astrid Øvre Helland
"Krever rapport om aksjon mot Valdresekspressen"
''

Bergens Tidende ''Bergens Tidende'' is Norway's fifth-largest newspaper, and the country's largest newspaper outside Oslo. ''Bergens Tidende'' is owned by the public company Schibsted ASA. Norwegian owners held a mere 42% of the shares in Schibsted at the end ...

'', 14 November 2013 the situation was initially reported as a road accident, and before emergency responders arrived, some passersby had tried unsuccessfully to persuade the man to open the door. The fire brigade and ambulance service arrived on the scene before the police and captured the suspect.Fridgeir Walderhaug and Tuva Bønke Grønning
"- Vi forstår at folk setter spørsmålstegn med en responstid på en time og elleve minutter"
''Dagbladet'', 5 November 2013 Counter-terrorism police had been alerted but were called off after the suspect was taken into custody.

Suspect and victims

Suspect

The suspected hijacker was a man from

South Sudan South Sudan (; din, Paguot Thudän), officially the Republic of South Sudan ( din, Paankɔc Cuëny Thudän), is a landlocked country in East Africa. It is bordered by Ethiopia, Sudan, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the C ...

born in 1982 who had applied for

asylum Asylum may refer to: Types of asylum * Asylum (antiquity), places of refuge in ancient Greece and Rome * Benevolent Asylum, a 19th-century Australian institution for housing the destitute * Cities of Refuge, places of refuge in ancient Judea * ...

in Norway in April 2013. The application was turned down in June on the basis that he had previously applied for asylum in Spain. He was settled in Årdal in August.Asle Hansen and Jørgen M. Gilbrant
"'Tilfeldig' at asylsøkeren drepte tre kvelden før tvangsutsendelse"
''Dagbladet'', 5 November 2013 He hijacked the bus the day before he was to be returned to Spain.Arnhild Aass Kristiansen, Fridgeir Walderhaug and Tuva Bønke Grønning
"Arve Kvernhaug (55) og Margaret Molland Sanden (19) ble drept i busstragedien"
''Dagbladet'', 5 November 2013 However, according to authorities, he had not been informed that he was about to be deported. According to Frode Forfang, director of the

Norwegian Directorate of Immigration Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe *Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway *Demographics of Norway *The Norwegian language, including the ...

, the man stated in an interview with the police upon arrival in Norway that he had psychiatric problems and cited health problems as grounds for seeking asylum in Norway. The authorities had not considered that his behaviour raised security concerns. In September 2014, he died from injuries sustained from jumping off a roof in prison.

Victims

* Margaret Molland Sanden, 19, of Årdalstangen, a student at

Oslo University College Oslo University College ( no, Høgskolen i Oslo; HiO) was the largest state university college in Norway from 1994 to 2011, with more than 18,000 students and approximately 1800 employees.

Mathias Vedeler
"Politiet frigir navnene på de drepte"
''

Aftenposten ( in the masthead; ; Norwegian for "The Evening Post") is Norway's largest printed newspaper by circulation. It is based in Oslo. It sold 211,769 copies in 2015 (172,029 printed copies according to University of Bergen) and estimated 1.2 million ...

'', 5 November 2013 * Brahim Khouya, 53, a Swedish citizen returning home to

Gothenburg Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...

after working in Årdal * Arve Kvernhaug, 55, of

Bagn Bagn is the administrative centre of Sør-Aurdal Municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. The village is located in the Begnadalen valley, about to the southeast of the town of Fagernes. The river Begna runs through the village on its way thro ...

, the bus driver

Investigation and judicial proceedings

The suspect was held at a psychiatric clinic in

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula of ...

and was scheduled to undergo a preliminary hearing with the Criminal Investigation Service on 14 November, but declined to answer questions at that time. he has still not made a statement to police, has been held in prison and under observation in a medical facility, and is expected to be tried in autumn 2014.

Reactions

Following the triple homicide, there were reports of insults to other asylum-seekers living at the centre in Årdal, and the local affiliate of Nor-Way Bussekspress made an agreement with the centre operator that asylum-seekers would not travel on that route for a week, for the drivers' sake. Some demanded psychiatric screening of asylum-seekers. On the afternoon of 16 November 2013, Prime Minister

Erna Solberg Erna Solberg (; born 24 February 1961) is a Norwegian politician and the current Leader of the Opposition. She served as the 35th prime minister of Norway from 2013 to 2021, and has been Leader of the Conservative Party since May 2004. Solberg wa ...

visited Årdal and laid down flowers and lit candles to commemorate the victims of the triple homicide. The police were criticised for taking so long to reach the scene; there have been calls for a national minimum standard response time and other changes. On 16 November the

Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK, an abbreviation of the Norwegian ''Norsk Rikskringkasting AS'', generally expressed in English as the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, is the Norwegian government-owned radio and television public broadcasting company, and the largest ...

published a report by the district police chief, Ronny Iden.

2003 hijacking

An earlier hijacking on the Valdresekspressen took place on 16 February 2003; a 26-year-old

Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...

n man killed the driver, 39-year-old Audun Bøland, and wounded some of the 34 passengers. He had previously killed an asylum-seeker at an asylum centre in

Fagernes is a town in Nord-Aurdal Municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. The town is the administrative centre of the municipality as well as the largest urban/commercial centre for the Valdres region. It is located just northwest of the village of ...

.Hanne Louise Åkernes and Nina Selbo Torset
"Valdresekspressen ble kapret i 2003"
''Aftenposten'', 4 November 2013

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Valdresekspressen hijacking 2013 murders in Norway Årdal Hijacking Bus transport in Norway Refugees in Norway Knife attacks Mass stabbings in Europe Stabbing attacks in 2013 November 2013 crimes in Europe Stabbing attacks in Europe