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2022 Guizhou bus crash
.png) In the early morning of 18 September 2022, 27 people were killed and 20 injured in a bus crash in Sandu Shui Autonomous County, Qiannan Prefecture, Guizhou, People's Republic of China (PRC). The bus overturned on a hilly section[2] of the highway that goes from Guiyang to Libo.[3] The bus was transporting 47 people to a quarantine facility.[3] The accident occurred at 2:40 a.m.[4][1] A circulating unverified photo shows a passenger bus towed by a truck, with a completely crumpled top.[1] BackgroundChina is a country with zero-COVID policies, where cities goes into a lockdown after a few positive cases. Local officials are responsible for controlling the virus and keeping outbreaks under control. The COVID-19 data of the day of the crash showed Guizhou had a spike in cases from 154 to 712 new confirmed cases the day before, being almost 70% of new COVID cases in China. It was announced that due to limited capacity in Guiyang, people needed quarantine "need to be transported to sister cities and states".[3] According to the Specification for road passenger transportation enterprise safety management (Chinese: 《道路旅客运输企业安全管理规范》),[5] passenger buses are not allowed to drive on the highway from 2 a.m. to 5 a.m.[4] CrashThe bus departed from Yunyan District at 12:10 a.m., carrying 47 people, 45 of whom were "related to the COVID-19", plus one driver and one staff.[6][7] When the bus was on the way from Sandu Shui Autonomous County to Libo County, leaving 32 kilometres (20 mi) from the Sandu County at 2:40 a.m., the bus overturned and fell into the roadside deep ditch.[6][7] LegalAs a result of the public anger, it was announced on 20 September that three officials in charge of the Yunyan district were fired by Guiyang.[8][9] ReactionsThe accident caused anger by Chinese citizens over the strict COVID policies in China and the lack of transparency from authorities.[3] It also raised commotion that the bus was traveling during the night, while many major roads in the region were closed.[1] A woman who claimed to be the daughter of one of the victims wrote a note on social media saying she could "not accept" her mother's death.[4] Multiple widely shared blogs about the accident, particularly the critical ones, were deleted from WeChat.[3] One of the most popular comments about the crash at WeChat is: "All of us are on this bus", indicating a form of powerlessness.[3] The accident became on Sunday afternoon a top trending topic at Weibo, but suddenly it disappeared from the top-50 trending topics.[3] Hu Xijin, the former editor in chief of the Global Times and usually a defender of the zero-COVID policy, doubted why the bus was still on the way after 2 a.m. He questioned on Sina Weibo that "why did Guiyang city have to transport quarantine subjects in a manner that is suspected of serious violations?" and "for such a large-scale, long-distance transport, did it really have to be done so late at night, and was there really no alternative?"[6] During a press conference, the deputy mayor of Guiyang apologized for the accident, bowed and had a moment of silence.[8] See also
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