Two dead, 15 injured

Jul 01, 2010 News

… Kwakwani accident

Kwakwani was plunged into mourning yesterday afternoon, after news of a fatal accident, which claimed the lives of two men, spread like wildfire through the community. The dead were identified as Rusal employee Herman Wade, called Toots, and Terry Woolford of Lamp Island.

The driver of the minibus Mark Adams

The injured numbered 15. Some of them were identified as Lindon Barkoye, Shefton Jones, Raymond Welchman, Clive Lagadoo, Otis Conway, Danny Lambert, Valley Mittleholzer, George Shakespeare, Sherwyn Sealey and one Jason.
A Ministry of Agriculture vehicle which was in the vicinity of the accident assisted in transporting the injured persons to the Kwakwani Hospital.
Wade and about 15 other workers attached to Rusal Bauxite Company at Aroaima, were travelling to work for the night shift on a bus operated by the bauxite company and driven by Mark Adams. A pick-up driven by a logger identified only as Sherwin, of Kuruduni Logging Company, was heading in the opposite direction. The vehicles were on the trail used by miners, loggers and people traveling to and from the bauxite company.
The two vehicles collided head on. Woolford, one of the dead men was a passenger in the pick up. Sherwin, the pick up driver He was reportedly unscathed, and walking around, as though ‘nothing had happened’
At press time he was in police custody.
The accident reportedly occurred about eighteen miles from Kwakwani.
Kwakwani residents converged at the local hospital to check for their relatives and friends who were in the two vehicles.
One Rusal worker who preferred to remain anonymous, said, “I couldn’t take it; too much confusion, too much wailing, too much blood. I had to come away, as I got an instant headache’.
The man claimed that it seemed as though the whole of Kwakwani had converged at the hospital, and that the situation was ‘chaotic’.
He said that he was doubtful that the Kwakwani Hospital could accommodate or tend to all of the injured. It seemed as though everyone in the bus had suffered injuries, he said.
When news reached the city Capt Gerry Gouveia of Roraima Airways, and Alvin Clarke of the Guyana Defence Force flew into the bauxite town with an Islander and the army Skyvan to transport the injured to the Georgetown Public Hospital.
The Skyvan brought out seven of the most seriously injured while Capt Gouveia brought out Mark Adams who sustained broken limbs and spinal injuries.
The Roraima Airways craft then turned around and headed back to Kwakwani.
Capt Gouveia said that there was an initial attempt to land at Linden but the attempts to light up the airstrip there was not enough to ensure a landing.
The aircrafts landed at Ogle where only recently the facility was upgraded to a regional airport with an extended landing strip and proper lighting.
The aircraft were shuttling the injured from Kwakwani where the medical staff at the hospital tried to stabilize the injured before having them transported to the city. And the injured were still arriving well after midnight.