MADRID, Dec 27 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Rescuers found the body of a woman in Spain’s northwestern Galicia region on Monday, raising to seven the number who died after a bus plunged into a river on Christmas Eve, police said.
The accident happened on Saturday as the bus was crossing a bridge over the Lerez river near Pedre village about 50km south of Santiago de Compostela.
The regional La Voz de Galicia newspaper said the bus had plunged from a height of nearly 30m into the river.
Rescuers located two survivors – the driver and a woman passenger – and found six bodies in searches that continued into Christmas Day, wrapping up rescue efforts in the evening after believing that everyone was accounted for.
But on Monday morning, they resume their search after the passenger who survived said a friend she had been travelling with was not on the list of victims, a Guardia Civil police spokesman said.
“When the injured woman was able to speak, she told us she had been travelling with a friend and that they had been due to have dinner together,” he said.
The woman had not been reported missing as nobody was waiting for her, he said.
“We resumed the search today and the helicopter spotted her body in the river,” he said, saying efforts were under way to extract her body.
Investigators are looking into the cause of the accident.
The Guardia Civil said the bus driver, who survived, had tested negative for alcohol and drugs. He was released from hospital on Monday, local media said.
Local officials said one of the victims was a young Peruvian woman who worked with elderly people. — NNN-AGENCIES
