THE Cooreville Gardens community in Kingston awoke to tragedy outside its doors yesterday after a speeding minibus ploughed into a group of commuters waiting at a bus stop, killing two persons and injuring four others.

Police said the driver of the Coaster minibus apparently mistimed a traffic signal at the busy Washington Boulevard/Duhaney Park intersection, crashed into a red Honda Civic motor car that was turning into Cooreville, careened out of control and into the bus stop just outside the entrance to the community.

Lori-Ann Townsend, 25, an employee of the agriculture ministry, was killed on the spot and Abigail Lugg, 10, student of the Greater Portmore Primary School, died at hospital, police said. Their deaths brought to 142, the number of road fatalities in the island since January 1 this year.

Four persons, including the driver of the motor car, Rohan Dawkins of Lauriston, St Catherine, were injured. His condition was considered serious.

“It is obvious that at least the driver of the bus was speeding and that he did not exercise due caution,” said Senior Superintendent Elan Powell, head of the traffic division of the Jamaica Constabulary Force.

“He was speeding from further up the road and he anticipated the change of the light from red to green but it didn’t happen like that. Even if he (bus driver) didn’t break the light, he was approaching an intersection…so he shouldn’t have been going so fast,” SSP Powell lamented.

Powell said the bus driver, who was the only person aboard at the time, fled the scene. However, he was later held by the police.

Police reported that Abigail was waiting on a number 16 bus to take her to school in Greater Portmore and Townsend was heading to Bodles in St Catherine where she was to attend a training session about 6:30 yesterday morning.

The minibus, licensed PC 2698, was travelling westerly along Washington Boulevard when it crashed into the motor car that was turning into Cooreville Gardens from the direction of Six Miles. The bus driver lost control of the vehicle which then slammed into a concrete wall before hitting Townsend and dragging her body several feet to the bus shed where several persons, including Abigail were hit. After dislodging the shed, the bus then crashed into a concrete utility pole.

A large crowd quickly massed around the mangled remains of the two vehicles, with some marvelling how the drivers had survived the impact. A newspaper vendor who sells near the traffic lights, supported Powell’s account of the accident, saying the bus, which plied the route between Cross Roads and Linstead in St Catherine and a shorter one between Half-Way-Tree and Spanish Town, failed to obey the traffic lights.

“Him did ah come from up deh so (direction of Molynes Road) an him did waan beat di light an lick inna di car man weh did ah turn,” said the vendor who asked that her name be withheld.

Another woman who spoke with the Observer on condition of anonymity, said she travelled from Portmore to Kingston yesterday morning on the same bus as the driver. She said, however, that she didn’t know his name.

A young man who identified himself to the Observer as the conductor of the bus but who also declined to give his name, said he was not onboard at the time of the incident.

He said the driver picked up the bus at a garage on Constant Spring Road and was heading to Spanish Town to load and head to Half-Way-Tree when he crashed.

At the Duhaney Park Police Sstation, Abigail’s father Anthony told the Observer he last saw his daughter Monday night when he paid her a visit at her home in the community.

“I went to see her last night and when I was leaving I hugged her and she said ‘I love you, daddy’ and I said ‘I love you too, baby’. And when I went outside she came out too and I asked her if everything was alright and she said ‘yes’.”

“She was saying goodbye to me but I didn’t know that was going to be the last time I would see my daughter,” Lugg moaned.

Winsome Townsend, for whom Lori-Ann was the first of two children, was in a similar state of shock. “I’m still in a state of denial. I can’t come to grips with it,” she said in a sombre, almost inaudible tone.

Meantime, SSP Powell appealed to motorists to “be very, very careful” and to obey the traffic signals and signs on the road.