The driver of No. 4 East End Bus, Edwin ‘Eddie’ Edwards’, life is hanging in the balance.
‘Doctors have said he has a 40 per cent chance of survival,’ said Dadford Dixon, one of the owners of the bus driven by Edwards.
32 seater bus hits tree by Caribbean Haven. |
The bus he was driving Friday collided with a tree at Breakers, right at the entrance to Caribbean Haven Treatment Centre. The accident took place at approximately 11.40 am.
According to the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service, ‘it appears a trailer came unhinged from a car heading west and it travelled into the path of the bus, which was heading east. The bus swerved to avoid the trailer and collided with the tree.’
At 3.30pm an air ambulance took Edwards off Island to Kingston, Jamaica, where he was admitted to the trauma centre at the University Hospital.
Mr. Dixon explained that ‘doctors at George Town Hospital said Edwards was not stable enough to fly out on Friday, due to significant blood loss from internal bleeding,’ so he went out the following day.
‘Jackson Memorial hospital was asking for a $130,000 deposit to admit him in their hospital and he had no insurance, he paid the money for the first couple of months and then he let it go, he said he didn’t want to pay it.’ Dixon added that he and his wife were able to come up with $15,000 for the air ambulance and another $1,500 for the doctor on the flight as well as an additional deposit for treatment at the hospital in Jamaica.
A spokesperson at the George Town Hospital confirmed ‘in addition to the driver, three passengers who were on the bus at the time of the collision have received medical treatment and one of those passengers is in serious condition with multiple leg fractures, he is currently in George Town Hospital’s Critical Care Unit.’ The other two, a male and a female were treated for broken ankles and have now been released from the hospital.
At the scene of the accident about half an hour after it took place, Pearlina Bodden, the owner of the No. 4 bus was asking people on the scene to pray for her driver Eddie. She looked visibly shocked by what had happened and was collecting Eddy’s possessions before heading down to the hospital to await the arrival of the air ambulance.
It is unclear at this time whether the trailer that appears to have come unhinged from the jeep was insured and licensed. Under Section 26 of the traffic regulations there is a provision for a fee for the licensing and inspecting of trailers. A different law, the motor vehicle law of 2006, section 3 (1) states that is illegal to use a trailer on the road without having it insured. At the scene of the crash, there was no sign of a license plate on the trailer; however it may have come off in the impact.
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