The bus with 65 passengers did not reach the bazaar According to the number of victims, the Sunday car accident in Chuvashia can be equated to an aviation one: 24 people died, 42 were taken to the hospital. In addition, at the scene of the incident, in the village of Yantikovo, ...

The bus with 65 passengers did not reach the bazaar

P

On the number of victims, Sunday's car accident in Chuvashia can be equated to an aviation accident: 24 people died, 42 were taken to hospital. In addition, at the scene, in the village of Yantikovo, every now and then one could hear words similar to aviation terms: “The landing rules have been violated.”

Boarding a bus with us always has the character of an evacuation, and even more so in villages where you can’t wait for the next bus. And if 65 people with baskets, bags and containers of milk squeezed into the "pazik", officially accommodating 36 passengers (28 seats and 8 standing), this means that there was simply no 66th person who wanted to leave. There would be a 66th - and he would push through.

Descent into neutral

The picture of what happened is clear enough. Before the village of Yantikovo there is a steep zigzag descent. All road signs are in place, and if you follow their instructions, then at a speed of 30 kilometers per hour you can slowly go down - not ice in August. However, local traffic cops say that there are no accidents here during icy conditions - drivers feel the danger and concentrate. And in normal weather, here the bus fell into a ravine (though from a lower height than now, and there were no casualties), and the asphalt roller flew out of the body of the KamAZ and cut into a corner log house.

The first version of what happened was faulty brakes. However, experts noted that everything was in order with the brakes. The bus did not have a left front shock absorber at all. He also lacked a speedometer cable (that is, the driver could not know how fast the car was going). Well, the tires were different, which ensures drifts on the road.

An experienced man was driving - Aleksey Khaibus (he survived) will turn 60 in two weeks. But the experience of drivers is sometimes not good for them. So, anyone experienced knows that you can save a little gasoline on the descent. According to the village drivers, here everyone descends "in neutral." There is an assumption that Haibus also switched to neutral speed. And the engine, which had not been able to start for half an hour before, stalled. And this means that the vacuum brake booster has stopped working. With what speed the crowded car rushed to the ravine - it's hard to even imagine. The driver realized that the bus could not be stopped, opened the doors and shouted: “Jump!”.

Two managed to jump out. The first was crane operator Nikolai Mikhailov (his wife Lydia died), and the second was 68-year-old grain stock watchman Timofey Yegorov. Nobody gave way to the old man, and he stood near the door. If I sat, I wouldn't even have time to get up. He barely made it to the bus. The villagers saw him running to the bus stop and waving to wait. Egorov, who escaped with a broken leg, was the only one on his way to church.

Operation "Bus" without anesthesia

What need drove the inhabitants of the three villages of the Yantikovsky district on Sunday to the city of Kanash? There is only one need: to sell something and to buy something. Selling milk at home is unprofitable. The oil plant takes it for only 2 rubles 20 kopecks per liter. We have to take bottles to the market. Before September 1, you need to dress up the children, but what can you buy in the village? The girl Svetlana entered the medical school and went with her mother to buy a white coat. Her mother died, her daughter is in the hospital. The retired couple went for broiler chickens, which are scarce in the conditions of the village. Both died.

Recently, many of us have become afraid of aircraft, especially Russian, half-worn ones. Meanwhile, no less dangerous are rattling and falling apart buses. The technical condition of the "PAZ" that collapsed into the ravine has already been said. It can be added that the next day, employees of the Yantikovsky traffic police stopped and checked four more buses, also belonging to the Kanashsky PATP. All four were faulty: tires that were worn out and ready to burst on the move, speedometers that were not working, turn signals and “stop lights” that were not working. And such cars are released on a flight in the midst of the All-Russian operation "Bus", which is announced by billboards on the roads!

According to statistics, every second Russian bus has been in operation for more than 10 years. On what roads he rumbles all these years - a separate conversation. Among the regions of the country, Chuvashia suffers not the biggest losses from bus accidents, and yet the numbers are depressing. In the first half of the year, buses got into accidents here 43 times. 13 people were killed and 60 injured. And here again I had to make sure that the price of human life is not high in our country. Especially on market day.