ANOTHER coach accident on a winding mountain road has claimed a holidaymaker's life just 12 days after a Swiss man died when a bus overturned on the island.
Two others were seriously injured and seven suffered minor wounds when a parked coach reversed and hit them.
This time, 43 Spanish, Italian and Austrian tourists were travelling on the coach between Fataga and Tunte on the GC-60 at the time of the accident, 14.50hrs on Saturday.
One of the coach party started to feel travel-sick and asked to get off the bus for a moment and, when she did, was joined by nine others.
The driver apparently did not realise that the group was standing behind the coach and leaning against it when he reversed back to get himself at the right angle to take the next sharp bend.
He ran over all 10 of them, knocking an Italian man off the side of the cliff and causing severe chest wounds to a 69-year-old man and serious head injuries to a woman.
The Italian suffered a fall of about five metres down a hill and was killed outright, and his distraught wife sat with his body until he was taken away, say emergency services.
A 45-year-old French tour guide suffered wounds to her ribs, including at least one fracture and a 76-year-old Spanish tourist sustained a severe blow to his leg.
Two other passengers, a man of 58 and a woman of 38 sustained chest and neck wounds respetively.
Three women – a 65-year-old Italian, a 71-year-old Austrian and a 55-year-old Spaniard – were taken by ambulance to the San Roque Meloneras health centre along with an 81-year-old Austrian man.
The rest were taken to hospital either by helicopter or ambulance.
