Signs on the road give clues to what caused the accident

Signs on Rangárvallavegur road at the scene of the bus accident on Saturday give certain clues as to what caused the accident. The driver and all 26 passengers of the bus were Icelanders, and each of them was taken to hospital with injuries.

“Now we are collecting data and taking reports. We will be interviewing people probably throughout the week.  This is a lot of people,” said Jón Gunn­ar Þór­hall­sson, Chief of Police in the South to mbl.is.

Article on Iceland Monitor

20 passengers in a bus accident yesterday

Signs on the scene

Do we know what caused the accident?

“No, but there are natural signs on the ground that show this somewhat, but there’s nothing we’ll release yet. It’s going to be confirmed and so on, and then the whole investigation process goes through,” he says.

So signs on the road give certain clues?

“Yes,” he says.

Like being in a washing machine

No one died in the accident, but as stated above, everyone was injured and taken to hospital. He says he didn’t have information about people’s condition at this time, but the last time he knew, people’s condition was stable.

Þórhallsson says that it seems like the bus rolled down one full lap but adds that it isn’t completely confirmed. It’s a well-known phenomenon that people don’t wear strapped seat belts in such buses and he was asked if this was the case now and if people were flying out of their seats in the bus.

“What helps here is a soft underlayer, there’s a moss. So it’s helping, but in this kind of roll-over, it becomes like a washing machine in these type of large buses,” he says.

So the people weren't wearing seatbelts?

“There can be all kinds of things going on and we won’t know until we talk to everyone and look at the bus,” he says.