Bus travelling from Goa to Mumbai plunges off bridge killing at least 37 people

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Rescue officials and bystanders gather around the wreckage of a bus after it fell from a bridge at Khed, roughly 350 kilometres south of Mumbai, India on March 19, 2013. Approximately 37 people were reported dead with another 15 injured following the crash. STRDEL/AFP/Getty Images

NEW DELHI — A bus packed with passengers crashed through a guard rail and fell off a bridge in western India early Tuesday, killing at least 37 people and injuring another 15, police said.

The overnight bus was carrying passengers from the beach resort state of Goa to Mumbai when it crashed in Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra, said Mahendra Singh Pardeshi, a police official present at the site. The area is about 200 kilometres south of Mumbai.

The cause of the accident was not immediately clear.

The driver was among those injured in the pre-dawn accident.

The bus had a capacity of 55 passengers, but Pardeshi said it was not known how many people were on board.

Early, blurred video of the accident showed that the bus broke through the guard rail on the bridge and fell several metres to the bank of the Jagbudi River below.

01:31ET 19-03-13

Tags: bridge, bus, crash, dead, Goa, injured, Mumbai