Expert psychologists are said to be assisting the widow, who is believed to have been sat alongside her partner before the horror bus crash in La Gomera on Friday afternoon
The widow of the British pensioner killed in yesterday’s horror bus crash in the Canary Island of La Gomera was among the 27 passengers hospitalised, it emerged overnight.
Regional health chiefs said late yesterday the unnamed woman remained at its state hospital as they updated earlier information pointing to 21 casualties being discharged to say she was the only patient still being treated there. Expert psychologists are said to be assisting the British holidaymaker, believed to have been sitting beside her partner when the packed bus came off the road on a bend around 1.15pm yesterday and plunged 100ft down a ravine, by helping her come to terms with her loss.
Overnight it emerged two more victims with serious injuries had been airlifted to a hospital on the neighbouring island of Tenerife following the earlier transfer of two others.
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They include the bus driver, who attempted to stop the vehicle by steering it onto a dirt track after a suspected brake failure, and was among four people seriously hurt. The vehicle, a tourist bus which belonged to La Gomera Tours, is set to be removed today so police can begin to carry out a full off-site inspection as they try to nail down the cause of the accident.
It was the second fatal crash on the same GM-2 road connecting the capital San Sebastian with the rest of the mountainous island in less than a year.
Last May a 73-year-old Spanish woman died and 11 others were injured when a public transport bus overturned on a straight stretch of the road just over a mile away and tumbled down a hill. The Brits on board yesterday’s crash vehicle, who included three minors, were starting their journey back to the UK after finishing their holidays at a 102-apartment resort in Playa de Santiago on La Gomera’s southernmost tip called El Balcon de Santa Ana.
The hotel manager spent most of yesterday at Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe Hospital after agreeing to assist the British consulate. The whereabouts of the tourists discharged from the island hospital was not immediately clear this morning.
In an update last night a regional government-run emergency response coordination centre, confirming the widow of the 77-year-old Brit killed was among those hurt, said “Four people have been transferred to hospitals in Tenerife including the bus driver.
At the request of the British consulate, the hotel manager where the passengers were staying is at the hospital carrying out consular duties. “The College of Psychology and the Red Cross have provided psychological care to those affected at the hospital. All have been discharged except the deceased’s wife.”
“The bus is currently shored up in the area, pending removal tomorrow.” Two of the British passengers who had earlier been airlifted to hospitals in Tenerife following initial assistance at the hospital in La Gomera are a man aged 73 and another aged 42.
Health officials have said they suffered “severe multiple injuries.” The bus driver is a local man believed to be in his fifties who his employers say does the same route virtually every day. Juan Luis Navarro, the central government’s representative on the island, said he tried to avoid the tragedy by “fighting it” from the moment he detected an apparent brake failure.
He is understood to have veered onto a dirt track after swerving off the road on a sharp bend before bringing the vehicle to a halt at the last moment, although too late to avoid it plunging down the ravine.
Mr Navarro said: “Fortunately it stopped before the fall because otherwise this accident could have been much more serious.” La Gomera Tours, the bus owner and operator, insisted in the aftermath of the tragedy all its vehicles were “up to date” with inspections and it wasn’t aware of any incident or complaint from their drivers regarding that stretch of road.
A representative later told Spanish media the local man at the wheel is an experienced driver who passes the spot where the crash occurred “virtually every day.”
Staff at the resort where the Brits had been staying said yesterday afternoon they were on their way to the port in the island capital before taking a ferry to Tenerife. Later it emerged they were due to head to the airport when they reached the neighbouring island for a flight home.
Tour operator The Holiday Property Bond said in a statement yesterday: “The Holiday Property Bond is aware of a serious coach incident on the island of La Gomera in the Canary Islands today involving some of our bondholders and guests.
“The coach was transferring holidaymakers to the airport, to return home. Our immediate focus is on the safety and wellbeing of everyone affected. We recognise this is an extremely distressing situation for those involved, as well as for their families and loved ones, and our thoughts are with them at this difficult time.”
Speaking yesterday afternoon a spokesman for the Civil Guard said: “The man who died in the bus crash in La Gomera is a 77-year-old British national.”
“The investigation into the cause of the accident is continuing.” A local court will coordinate the probe. Foreign secretary Yvette Cooper said in a post on X: “My thoughts are with those affected by the tragic incident involving a bus carrying British holidaymakers in the Canary Islands.”
Canary Islands president Fernando Clavijo said in the aftermath of the crash: “Following the accident of a bus reported in La Gomera and the work of the emergency teams who are intervening at this moment. “My support to the victims and their families” Angel Victor Torres, Minister for Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, said: “Tragic news in La Gomera, with the confirmation of one person deceased.
“Very attentive to the actions in these first moments of the emergency services and the healthcare personnel. With a heavy heart. May there be no more victims.”
