Seven dead in New Mexico after Greyhound bus collides with truck

Seven people were killed in New Mexico on Thursday after a Greyhound passenger bus collided head-on with a semi-trailer truck that jumped a highway median strip, state police said. A tire blew out on the eastbound truck, which jumped the grass median to hit the bus travelling in the opposite direction, police officer Ray Wilson told a news conference. The bus was carrying 49 passengers, a Greyhound spokeswoman said. It collided with the truck around 12 pm on Interstate 40 near the city of Thoreau, about 100 miles west of Albuquerque, the state police said. All but six of those on the bus were taken to nearby hospitals, said Wilson, adding that their injuries were minor and treated at the site. Injuries to the driver of the semi-trailer truck were not life threatening, state police said. Greyhound Lines spokeswoman Crystal Booker said the bus was headed from Albuquerque to Phoenix, but deferred comment on the crash to the state police. The National Transportation Safety Board said a team of its investigators would arrive on the scene early on Friday. The truck blew a tire, sending the rig across the median and into oncoming traffic where it smashed into the bus Credit: AP Investigators were uncertain of the truck's cargo, but Wilson said: "There are a lot of vegetables" at the crash site. He did not know if speed was a contributing factor to the crash. Eric Huff was heading to the Grand Canyon with his girlfriend when they came across the crash. Huff said the semi's trailer was upside down and "shredded to pieces," and the front of the Greyhound bus was smashed, with many of the seats pressed together. Part of the side of the bus was torn off, he said. "It was an awe-inspiring terrible scene," he said. Passing motorists described a chaotic scene with passengers on the ground and people screaming. Credit: AP Truck driver Santos Soto III shot video showing the front of the Greyhound sheared off and the semi split open, with its contents strewn across the highway. He saw people sobbing on the side of the road as bystanders tried to comfort them. "I was really traumatised myself, because I've been driving about two years and I had never seen anything like that before," Soto said. "I'm a pretty strong person and I broke down and cried for at least 30 minutes," he added. Gallup Indian Health Services received 37 of the injured, said Jennifer Buschick, a spokeswoman for the Gallup hospital. Six people with injuries too severe to be treated there were stabilised and taken to the University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque. Three of the six taken to UNMH were in critical condition but the condition of the rest had not been released, said spokeswoman Cindy Foster.