A bus veered off a road and plunged down an embankment on a steep mountain pass in northern South Africa, killing at least 42 people and leaving another 49 passengers injured, authorities said on Monday.
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The crash happened around 6pm on Sunday, on the N1 highway near the town of Louis Trichardt, around 400km (248 miles) north of the capital, Pretoria.
The Transport Ministry said in a statement that the victims included seven children, 17 men and 18 women. It said six people were critically injured and another 31 had serious injuries and had been taken to several hospitals. One critically injured child was airlifted to a hospital, the ministry said.
Images released by authorities showed the blue bus lying upside down in the embankment, with rescuers working underneath it to search for victims. The Limpopo provincial government said rescue operations continued late into Sunday night.
The bus was travelling to Zimbabwe and was carrying Zimbabwean and Malawian nationals who were on their way to their home countries, the Transport Ministry said. It said the cause of the crash was not yet known.
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