Pietermaritzburg ( Curry’s Post ) N3 North Bound Between Lions River and Nottingham Road.
Sixty Eight commuters along with two bus crew have been stranded this afternoon after the bus they were travelling in caught alight.
ER24 along with other emergency personnel received a call saying that a bus was on fire and was uncertain if there were any injuries. Paramedics rushed to the scene to find a fully engulfed bus in the emergency lane. All the commuters had been evacuated and were standing a few meters up the freeway away from the fire. They were assessed and found that no was hurt in the incident.
The freeway was closed to traffic travelling north while Fire Department tired to extinguish the fire. The commuters had lost everything including two tourists from the United States as their passports and airplane tickets were all in the luggage compartment of the bus. Commuters were given some refreshments that ER24 had bought for them until further assistants had arrived
It is unclear what caused the bus to catch alight but it is believed that the bus may have had a mechanical problem causing the bus to catch a light. A second bus was sent to fetch the stranded commuters but broke down 1km after picking them up from the scene.
Derrick Banks
ER24
We would like to urge all vehicle owners to view the information on vehicle fire:
• Escape and Safety from Vehicle Fire
• Fire Stryker and extinguishing fires

















2 Comments Received
March 23rd, 2010 @3:49 am
Seen their million rand TV advert claiming they are the best of the best of transporting people around the country? Now that is misleading advertisement of the criminal kind. Also check our local customer website:
http://www.hellopeter.com/SA+Roadlink/complaints-and-compliments/ and you will see that they have had 71 complaints about these crooks in the past year and ONLY 3 compliments…What a joke Road Link is, the link to HELL.
March 23rd, 2010 @8:33 am
I was stuck in the traffic jam due to the fire.
I am not surprised at the bus fire though. These buses are prone to overheating and drive with their rear engine bay doors OPEN, as I saw yesterday. This is acknowledgement that they are not designed for South African conditions, and should be removed from the road by the traffic authorities. The number plates and reflectors sometimes cannot be seen when the engine doors are open for cooling.
Engine compartments should legally be enclosed, so many of the buses travelling the N3 route are in effect illegally on the road.
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