Hungary struggles to identify bus victims
Print Edition
IT could take days to officially identify the 16 people killed when a bus carrying Hungarian students returning from a ski trip crashed in Italy and burst into flames, Hungary’s foreign minister said yesterday.
There were 54 passengers and two Hungarian drivers on the bus that crashed on an Italian highway near Verona just before midnight on Friday, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said. Two adults hospitalized in critical condition also have yet to be identified.
Szijjarto, visibly shaken by news of the accident, said the days ahead would remain emotionally challenging.
“A day has passed since the tragedy, and it is clear that the pain is even sharper,” he said. “As the shock fades, the losses become even more excruciating. The long and more painful process, like the identification of the bodies, is about to begin.”
Most of the passengers were students from a Budapest high school returning from a ski trip in France. Four passengers remained hospitalized with serious injuries. Szijjarto said one of the unidentified adults in critical condition suffered third-degree burns on over 60 percent of his body, while the other person had undergone surgery for a head injury.
Szijjarto said the causes of the accident have yet to be determined. Italian officials said the bus burst into flames after hitting a highway barrier and then ramming into an overpass support column. “The bus was practically fully destroyed by the pillar of the highway overpass,” Szijjarto said. “For now, we can’t responsibly say how exactly the bus got there and have not received any pertinent information.”
Judit Timaffy, the Hungarian consul in Milan, said that a “hero professor” identified as physical education teacher Gyorgy Vigh dashed repeatedly into the bus pulling students to safety. Vigh lost two of his own children in the crash.
“He didn’t succeed in saving the son and daughter,” the consul said. The teacher’s wife was aboard and “she saw her daughter die. She didn’t see her son at all, but unfortunately he was among the deceased.”
The son has been identified as Balazs Vigh, a former ice hockey goalkeeper for Ferencvarosi TC in Budapest.
Hungarian officials said with exception of the two in critical condition, the rest of the injured and the other passengers were expected to arrive in Budapest later yesterday. Candles were still burning yesterday outside Szinyei Merse Pal high school, where hundreds of students, parents and friends took part in a vigil on Saturday evening.
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