LIMA: Peruvian emergency workers on Wednesday said they had recovered 50 bodies – six of them children – from a horrific bus crash over a cliff north of the capital Lima.
The coach had plunged around 100 meters over a seaside cliff in Peru on Tuesday after a collision with a truck on a precarious stretch known as the "devil's curve."
It had been travelling from Huacho, 130 kilometres north of the capital, to Lima with 55 passengers registered and two crew on board. The vehicle landed upside down on rocks at the edge of the sea.
"We have finished the painful task of recovering the bodies. Fifty bodies have been recovered from the accident," the regional head of Lima's health service, Felic Palomo, told radio station RPP.
"They have been identified by their next of kin," he said.
The latest toll was higher than the 48 deaths previously given by the interior ministry.
Efforts to get at the bodies were suspended Tuesday night because the tide had risen and reached the bus, the police said.
More than 200 workers from the police, army and navy took part in the rescue and recovery effort. A police helicopter had to winch some rescue workers to the wreck of the blue bus while others made the precarious journey down on foot with the assistance of ropes.
Crews were still at the scene to ascertain whether any more bodies remained in the crushed bus.
There were six survivors, all injured. But most on board perished.
One passenger, Maximo Jimenez, 24, saved himself by jumping through a window on the bus just as he saw it careen off the road.
He suffered a broken arm and took himself to hospital in a taxi, according to doctors who treated him. -- AFP