Five Dutch tourists die when a coach overturns near Susch

Five people on a Dutch coach died on Thursday afternoon when the bus left the road in a construction stretch between Zernez and Susch in eastern Switzerland and turned onto its side. Police in the canton of Graubunden said the coach was travelling toward Susch at about 16:45. First findings are that it struck a guardrail in a works zone, ran off to the right and overturned.

The dead were all over 70. Ambassador Karin Mossenlechner named a 79-year-old woman from Rotterdam, an 80-year-old woman from Maastricht, a 71-year-old woman from Haarlem, a 75-year-old woman from Noord-Brabant (Uden, according to Brabants Dagblad) and a 75-year-old man from Groningen. Early police statements had spoken of five dead without names. A later Dutch report listed four women and one man; one garbled dispatch added a sixth name and was not repeated by the embassy.

The count from the roadside

Police said three people were critically hurt, seven moderately hurt and 30 slightly hurt. Seven helicopters and 13 ambulance crews moved the injured. About 45 adults were on board in the police account. The Dutch travel-trade body ANVR, speaking for tour operator Oad, said the group was 48 passengers plus the driver. The coach had left the Netherlands on Monday and was on a day trip into Switzerland from Austria, headed for the Engadin and the Swiss National Park at the foot of the 2,383-metre Fluela Pass.

The Graubunden public prosecutor is working with cantonal police on the cause. Officers have not named another vehicle. Identity work on every passenger ran into Friday night.

Swiss President Guy Parmelin said he was deeply shocked and offered condolences. King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima wrote that their "hearts go out to the bereaved, to everyone currently fearing for the fate of their loved ones and to the injured."

A narrow valley road in works season

The Zernez-Susch road is a standard coach line into the national park. In September it also carries roadworks. A guardrail, a narrowed lane and a high-sided bus are a known mix. The investigation will have to fix speed, signage and whether the works zone was marked in a way a foreign driver could read at 16:45.

For the families the immediate facts are simpler. Five people who started the week in Dutch towns are dead on an Engadin verge. Three more are in intensive care. The prosecutor's file will not return them. It can only say whether the works zone, the driver or the bus itself put them there.