Poland's bus disaster of 1994 was a
bus
A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...
crash near
Gdańsk involving a commuter bus
PKS (''Polska Komunikacja Samochodowa'') that veered into a road-side tree. In the accident, 32 people died and 43 were injured.
Accident
The accident occurred on the
afternoon
Afternoon is the time after solar noon. It is the time when the sun is descending from its peak in the sky to somewhat before its terminus at the horizon in the west. In human life, it occupies roughly the latter half of the standard work a ...
of Monday, 2 May 1994. After a twenty-minute scheduled stop at a depot in
Zawory, the bus – an
Autosan
Autosan Sp. z o.o. is a Polish bus and coach manufacturer. The company is located in Sanok, Poland.
Its sales network includes European (also non-EU countries), African and Asian countries.
Currently it produces approximately 300 buses a ...
H9-21 – began its return to Gdańsk with just two passengers. However, at the next scheduled stop in
Chmielenek, several more people boarded the bus. Further along the route, large crowds of travelers boarded the vehicle at stops in
Chmielno and in
Kartuzy
Kartuzy () ( Kashubian ''Kartuzë'', ''Kartëzë'', or ''Kartuzé''; formerly german: Karthaus) is a town in northern Poland, located in the historic Eastern Pomerania ( Pomerelia) region. It is the capital of Kartuzy County in Pomeranian Voivode ...
. At
Żukowo
Żukowo ( csb, Żukòwò, german: Zuckau, la, Sucovia) is a town in the Kartuzy County, in the Pomeranian Voivodeship of northern Poland, in the geographical region of Kashubia, with 6,236 inhabitants (2005). It is located along the Radunia ri ...
, the driver acquiesced to the request of some travelers to make a stop. Finally, when the bus stopped in
Leźno, an additional eight people boarded. By this time, the overcrowded vehicle was carrying 74
passengers, far in excess of the maximum allowable capacity of 51 (39 sitting, 12 standing).
32 kilometers after the start of its journey and 500 meters before its next scheduled stop in Gdańsk-
Kokoszki, the overloaded bus veered off the road and crashed into a tree while attempting to pass a
Jelcz
Jelcz (pronounced like ''Yelch'' after the town of the same name) is a Polish brand of trucks, military vehicles, buses and trolley buses produced by ''Zakłady Samochodowe Jelcz''/''Jelczańskie Zakłady Samochodowe'', with both names roughly ...
truck. The force of the impact drove the tree 4,2 meters into the body of the bus. In the
collision
In physics, a collision is any event in which two or more bodies exert forces on each other in a relatively short time. Although the most common use of the word ''collision'' refers to incidents in which two or more objects collide with great fo ...
, 25 passengers died immediately, with five passengers dying shortly after while being transported to local hospitals (two of them before reached hospitals.) Two additional victims died five and six days after crash, respectively, while the
driver, Jerzy Marczyński, survived.
Cause of accident
The court case was closed in 1999, after a one and a half year inquiry into the accident.
The immediate cause of the accident was found to be the explosion of the front right tire, with contributing causes given as:
* Overcrowding on the bus (77 passengers instead of 51)
* The excessive speed of the bus during the accident sequence (60 km/h instead of 50 km/h)
* Generally poor condition of the 11-year-old bus
The tree which the bus struck was cut down in February 2008.
See also
*
List of Poland disasters by death toll
Sources
News item at wiadomosci.polska.pl (in Polish)* Jarosław Reszka, "Goodbye! We are gone..." The biggest catastrophes in post-war Poland.
* "Gazeta Wyborcza" archives articles
1994 road incidents
Bus incidents in Poland
1994 in Poland
May 1994 events in Europe
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