Five dead after a Dutch tour coach overturns in the Engadine

Five people died and 40 were injured when a Dutch tour coach left the road between Zernez and Susch in canton Graubunden on Thursday afternoon and overturned. Graubunden cantonal police confirmed the figures on Friday. Three of the injured were in critical condition, seven had moderate injuries and 30 had slight injuries. All 45 people on board were adults: 44 passengers and the driver.

The coach belonged to the Dutch operator Oad. It had left the Netherlands on Monday and was on a day trip into Switzerland from Austria. Police said the vehicle was travelling from Zernez toward Susch at 4:45 p.m. Near the hamlet of Less, in a roadworks zone, it went off the road, hit a guardrail and came to rest on its side. No other vehicle was involved. The Graubunden public prosecutor's office is investigating with the cantonal police. The cause has not been announced.

Seven rescue helicopters, some from outside Switzerland, and 13 ambulance crews moved the casualties to hospitals in the region. The municipality of Zernez opened a reception centre. Dutch embassy staff arrived to help with identification and next-of-kin work. Swiss President Guy Parmelin said he was deeply shocked and offered condolences to the families.

Zernez sits at the gate of the Swiss National Park, more than 100 square kilometres of reserve in the Engadine. Susch lies toward the foot of the 2,383-metre Fluela Pass. The road is a standard tourist corridor in September, narrow in places and often under repair after the winter. A construction zone on that corridor is not unusual. A coach on its side beside it is.

Early reports put 48 or 49 people on the bus. Police later fixed the number at 45. The Dutch Association of Travel Companies, speaking for Oad, first told De Telegraaf it could not confirm deaths or injuries. The Friday police bulletin replaced that uncertainty with a count. Identity work was still running on Friday night.

Oad is a mid-size Dutch operator that sells coach circuits through Germany, Austria and the Alps. ANVR spoke for the firm in the first hours because that is how Dutch tour accidents are handled: the association takes the press calls while the company works the passenger list. The group was a paid autumn excursion sold as a package, which means the contract, the insurer and the Dutch inspectorate for transport all have a file to open.

Alpine coach rules in Switzerland require specific licences, tachograph records and a driver who knows the pass. Those records will be in the prosecutor's bundle. So will the layout of the works site at Less: cone spacing, lane width, posted speed and whether a temporary surface had been milled. Single-vehicle overturns on a descent or a camber change often leave a clear physical story. The police have not told that story yet.

For the families the next days are hospitals and consular lists. For Oad and ANVR they are the passenger manifest and the insurer. For Graubunden they are a works-site file and a road that will reopen with a different set of cones. Five dead on a Thursday run through the Engadine is already the measure of the trip that left the Netherlands on Monday.