An overloaded jeepney lost its brakes and fell into a meter-deep ditch in Licuan-Baay town in Abra province Saturday night, according to an official of the Department of Transportation and Communication. The accident follows a day after a bus fell into a ravine in Bontoc town in Mr. Province, killing 14 people and injuring 32 people.
DOTC Cordillera director Celina Claver received the report on the Abra accident on Sunday as she was preparing to head to Bontoc to investigate the bus accident.
The Cordillera region’s Office of Civil Defense (OCD) reported that the jeepney with plate number AYG 358 was ferrying 57 passengers. Some of the passengers were riding on top of the vehicle’s roof. The brakes malfunctioned as it was passing a sharp curve in Sitio (sub-village) Baquero, Barangay (village) Nalbuan in Licuan-Baay at 6:05 p.m.
The overloaded jeepney then crashed into a ditch, killing two girls, two women and a man, the OCD said.
Before the accident, the passengers who were beneficiaries of government’s conditional cash transfer program, attended an assembly at the Licuan-Baay town hall. They were on their way to Barangay Mapisla when the accident happened, OCD reports said.
With a report by Vincent Cabreza
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