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Government tightens supervision of chartered tour buses after deadly accidents
Following a string of tragic accidents involving chartered tour buses, the government screened the road-readiness of buses over the Waisak extended holiday in an attempt to improve what experts deemed as lackluster supervision of transportation providers.
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Police personnel remove bodies on Saturday from the wreckage of a study tour bus in Palasari village, Ciater district, Subang regency, West Java. The bus had been carrying students from Lingga Kencana vocational school (SMK) in Depok, West Java. The Subang Health Agency recorded that 11 people died in the crash. Nine of the victims were students, one was a teacher and another was a bystander from Cibogo, Subang. (Antara/Raisan Al Farisi)
Following a string of tragic accidents involving chartered tour buses, the government screened the road-readiness of buses over the Waisak extended holiday in an attempt to improve what experts deem as lackluster supervision of transportation providers.
The Transportation Ministry set up checkpoints in tourist destinations across the country to inspect the road-readiness of buses during the four-day holiday from May 23 until Sunday, when tour buses were expected to clog up roads.
These checkpoints, which operated every day throughout the holiday, were geared to ensure that buses had up-to-date paperwork and that they met the ministry’s safety standards.
The first day of inspections on Thursday revealed that less than half of the 67 buses inspected in three provinces, namely Jakarta, Banten and Riau, as well as Bogor regency in West Java, had their papers in order. The remaining buses either had expired papers or were operating without any paperwork.
“When it comes to cases like these, we will hand them over to the police to follow up on so that there will be a deterrent effect,” the ministry’s Land Transportation Director General Hendro Sugiatno said in a statement.
The ministry’s increased supervision came following at least four crashes in different parts of the country this month alone involving buses carrying students and teachers on out-of-town study tours.
