Children among at least 45 dead in Bulgaria bus fire

An official confirms children are among the dead and that seven survivors – who leaped out of the burning bus – are receiving hospital treatment in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, for burns.

At least 45 people – including 12 children – have been killed after a bus caught fire on a highway in western Bulgaria early on Tuesday.

A senior interior ministry official confirmed that children were among the dead and seven people – who had jumped out of the burning bus – had been taken to hospital for treatment in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, with burns.

The incident happened on the Struma Highway, 28 miles west of Sofia, at around 2 am local time, and either the “bus caught fire and crashed, or crashed and then caught fire”, Nikolai Nikolov said.

He said there were 45 fatalities. But the ministry later said there were 46 casualties, before giving a further update of one less than the toll given earlier.

The death toll was confirmed by Bulgaria’s national police chief Stanimir Stanev, who added 52 people were on board including the driver.

Most of the victims were tourists from North Macedonia, an official from the country’s embassy said, where the bus was registered and the driver was from.

They were on their way back to Skopje, the capital, after a weekend holiday trip to Istanbul in Turkey, said North Macedonian Foreign Minister Bujar Osman.

“People are clustered inside and are burnt to ash,” said Bulgaria’s Interior Minister Boyko Rashkov.

“The picture is terrifying, terrifying. I have never seen anything like that before,” he told reporters at the site.

SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES