S African minibus crash kills 14 schoolteachers

JOHANNESBURG, June 24 (Reuters) A South African minibus carrying a group of primary school teachers to a funeral collided with a truck today, killing 14 teachers.

The accident near Lichtenburg, about 120 km west of Johannesburg, killed two thirds of the teaching staff of the Diphetogo Primary School in nearby Mafikeng, including the principal, the SAPA news agency said.

''The remaining nine educators are surely traumatised themselves,'' North West provincial education department spokesman Charles Raseala said.

''It's the middle of the year and we will have to put our heads together and see that we assist those kids to reach the end of the year.'' Officials said preliminary indications were that the minibus had a puncture, causing the driver to lose control and crash head-on into the approaching truck. The bus driver and a teacher survived, as did the truck driver and his passenger, SAPA said.

REUTERS SHB PC1905