VOLUNTEER LUCKY TO BE ALIVE AFTER TRAFFIC COLLISION

by April Shacklock

On 26^th August 2012 at around 4:00pm, a Ford bus was hit by an oncoming car on the highway between Accra and Cape Coast, amongst the passengers was Rhys Durham, a volunteer at Coastal TV.

The bus had been travelling for about an hour when a hatchback swerved onto the wrong side of the road in an attempt to overtake the vehicle in front, however travelling on the other side of the road was the Ford bus which runs between Accra and Cape Coast. The driver of the car did not then have enough space to retreat behind the vehicle again. The bus attempted to swerve to avoid a collision, however the car impacted the bus at the driver’s door. The bus then rolled several times before landing on its side facing the wrong way. The exact number of fatalities is still uncertain however it is thought that three were pronounced dead on the scene, including the driver of the bus and two people in the car. Miraculously, everyone else in the bus was able to evacuate safely and only a few had minor injuries.

Rhys Durham, age 29, was situated in the back of the bus, he had been asleep prior to the collision and only woke when he heard the other passengers on the bus shouting when they spotted the car on the other side of the road beginning to move out. The next thing he felt was the impact of the car hitting the bus followed by the bus rolling onto the verge, he said: ‘I felt it roll once, and then it kept on going, I just kept thinking as long as we don’t hit anything or nothing hits us then we will be ok. We seemed to be rolling for ages but in reality it must have only been about three seconds. Everyone managed to stay in their seat more or less, which is amazing because no one was wearing a seat belt.’  It is not surprising that no one was wearing a seat belt, as Central Press reported in June 2012 that 90% of drivers do not wear seat belts. If the driver of the bus had been wearing a seat belt then maybe the consequences of the crash would not have been fatal for him.

 

Rhys said he was amazed at how calm everyone else was. People were helped out of the vehicles quickly and any injured were put into other cars and taken to the hospital. This is a necessary procedure in Cape Coast as there is only one ambulance to service the whole area. The bodies of the fatalities were simply left at the side of the road until the situation had been cleared. The calmness of the passengers is clearly a result of the fact that there are so many road traffic incidents in Ghana, it is a daily occurrence. The Ghana National Road Safety Commission statistics show that between 2002 and 2008, 13,166 people were killed in road accidents. Of that figure, 42% were pedestrians, 23% were passengers in buses, 12% were car occupants, while the remaining 23% consisted of riders and passengers of bicycles, motorcycles, and occupants of heavy goods vehicles and pickups. In 2011 the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit, reported that 2,330 Ghanaians died in road accidents with 13,572 road accidents being reported. And is not just human lives that are lost to road accidents, an average of 1.6% of Ghana’s GDP is lost every year to road accidents.

The passengers from the Ford bus were quickly ushered onto another tro-tro which would continue them on their journey to Cape Coast. Rhys said he saw many more risky overtaking maneuvers which demonstrates how constant the level of dangerous driving is in Ghana. Rhys also said he does not want to travel on anything other than a coach for the rest of his stay in Ghana as he does not feel safe in anything smaller.

 

There is a major issue to be addressed on the roads of Ghana. There is not enough monitoring of the standard of driving which means motorists do not follow the rules of the road, although this means too many people are paying for other drivers’ reckless mistakes with their life. There are many other factors contributing to the number of injuries and fatalities on the roads including: poor road surfaces, very few road signs, and the etiquette of public transport in Ghana, whereby passengers are discouraged from wearing seatbelts to allow other passengers in and out the vehicle quickly.

 

The number of road traffic accidents is only set to rise as car ownership in Ghana is soaring. The government needs to take serious action to ensure the number of accidents on the road decreases rather than escalates with the number of cars on the road. A simple measure which could be taken is to put more warning signs on the roads. Currently road signs are few and far between so many drivers underestimate the of risk overtaking on corners and summits as they have not been informed or warned about the road conditions.

 

Unfortunately for Rhys, this has not been his first disaster since he arrived in Ghana. During his first few days here he was playing a friendly game of rugby on the beach when he landed badly and cracked a rib! You can read all about Rhys’ dramatic experiences in his blog: http://rhysdurham.wordpress.com.