Chinese Daily Photos, 2011 to 2019!

More than a dozen people were killed in a horrific crash early Saturday when a discount bus flipped on a Bronx highway and careened into a metal traffic pole, officials said.

The top of the World Wide bus, which was returning to the city from the Mohegan Sun casino, was sheared off when it hit the sign alongside the New England Thruway just after 5:35 a.m.

Officials said 13 people died and another 20 were hospitalized after the sickening impact - which may have been caused by a hit-and-run driver.

Read more:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

"The bus was cut into two parts by the \[pole\]," said a survivor, Victor.

"I saw a lot of death," said Victor, as he sat dazed in the emergency room at Jacobi Medical Center. "People were crying. People were screaming."

Investigators said the bus was traveling south on I-95 and near the city line at the time of the catastrophic crash.

Cops were searching for a tractor-trailer believed to have made contact with the bus in the moments before the deadly crash.

The bus appeared to careen out of control, slam into a guardrail and then overturn on the highway near Exit 14, the ramp for the Hutchinson River Pkwy.

It skid on its side for about 250 yards and crashed directly into the massive traffic sign - and the steel pole tore through the bus' front windows.

Read more:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Chung Ninh woke up to a nightmare.

The 59-year-old was napping aboard a city-bound World Wide Bus after a night at casino when the vehicle suddenly careened out of control early Saturday. Ninh opened his eyes to the sights of gushing blood, flying glass - and far worse

Read more:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

"A man was screaming who had two arms cut off," the Chinatown resident recounted just hours after the wreck that killed 13 people and injured another 20.

"I helped some people," said Ninh, whose hand was cut by one of the shattered bus windows. "A lot of people dead. A lot of blood all over the people."

The bus roof was sliced off when the skidding vehicle fell on its side and slammed into a metal highway sign on I-95 in the Bronx.

Read more:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

It was headed to Chinatown at 5:45 a.m. with passengers returning from the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Conn.

Fellow survivor Jose Hernandez said only eight of the bus passengers escaped the carnage unscathed.

"The rest were dead or screaming for help," said Hernandez, 49. "We tried to help people, but there was a lot of twisted metals in the way."
Hernandez recalled seeing horrific sights, like one woman with a missing arm.

Ninh, who escaped through an emergency exit in the rear of the bus, said the horrific crash occurred in the blink of en eye.

"I was a half-second - very fast, and the bus stopped," he said. "Everything was all black at first. I couldn't see anything."

[email protected]

Read more:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

Geographer said:

You might be surprised how big and expensive police forces are in the United States. They are the lion's share of city budgets, then you have to add in county PDs, state PDs, the FBI, ATF, Secret Service. Since the article includes prisons and judicial systems, you have to include all the county jails, state prisons, federal prisons, and judicial system with staff.

If you look at the City of Chicago's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for 2009 (CAFRs are available to the public online for nearly every medium and large city in the United States), we see that public safety expenditures are $1.8 billion, 62 percent of the entire Chicago budget. Public safety includes fire, not sure about EMS, but they are peanuts compared to the police. This is typical for city that does not have their own school district. New York City includes a school district so public safety will take up a smaller chunk of their budget.

Click to expand...

Geographer said:

My point is that it is not surprising that China would spend more on their police force than military. I could just as easily spin it by saying this means China is more peaceful, that their military spending is less than their police spending.

Click to expand...

Emergency personnel investigate the scene of a bus crash on Interstate-95 in the Bronx borough of New York Saturday, March 12, 2011. At least thirteen people died when the bus, returning to New York from a casino in Connecticut, flipped onto its side and was sliced in half by the support pole for a large sign.

Click to expand...

A Chinese woman poses in a store in the quarter of Derb Omar in Casablanca on March 10, 2011. Derb Omar has become the Chinese business quarter.

Click to expand...

Taiwan opposition leader Tsai Ing-wen greets supporters at a press conference in Taipei on March 11, 2011. Tsai, chairwoman of the main opposition Democratic Progressive Party, announced her bid to run in the 2012 presidential election.

Click to expand...

Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou gives the keynote speech at the American Chamber of Commerce annual dinner, marking its 60 years in Taiwan, Wednesday, March 9, 2011, in Taipei, Taiwan. During the speech, Ma continued to express the island's hopes of military procurement from the U.S. , where advanced F-16 C/D fighter jets sit at the top of their list.

Click to expand...

Passengers wait on the platform after trains lay off in reaction to a tsunami alarm in Keelung of Taiwan, southeast China, March 11, 2011. Following a strong earthquake in Japan Friday, Taiwan had earlier issued a tsunami alarm, but later sounded the all clear after foreseeing no disasters despite several small tsunamis in the afternoon. (Xinhua)

Click to expand...

A newlywed couple plants a tree together in Qinhuangdao, North China's Hebei province, March 12, 2011. A total of 20 couples joined the tree-planting event to mark China's 33rd Arbor Day. [Photo/Xinhua]

Click to expand...

Geographer said:

What does the New York bus crash have to do with China? Were the passengers predominately Chinese?

Click to expand...

pugachev_diver said:

I heard it happened near Chinatown area, so majority of the passengers aboard were ethnic Chinese.

Click to expand...

China's Wang Shixian celebrates after winning a point against Japan's Eriko Hirose (not seen) during the womens singles final of the Badminton All England Open Championships at The National Indoor Arena in Birmingham, on March 13, 2011.

Click to expand...

BEIJING, CHINA - MARCH 13: A delegate of Buddhist monks leave the Great Hall of the People after the closing session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) on March 13, 2011 in Beijing, China. Known as 'liang hui,' or 'two organizations', it consists of meetings of China's legislature, the National People's Congress (NPC), and its advisory auxiliary, the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

Click to expand...

BEIJING, CHINA - MARCH 13: China's track and field 110 meter hurdler, Liu Xiang, attends the closing session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) at the Great Hall of the People on March 13, 2011 in Beijing, China. Known as 'liang hui,' or 'two organizations', it consists of meetings of China's legislature, the National People's Congress (NPC), and its advisory auxiliary, the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

Click to expand...

BEIJING, CHINA - MARCH 12: Members of the public visit the 16th China International Education Exhibition Tour at China World Exhibition Hall on March 12, 2011 in Beijing, China. Chinese Service Center for Scholarly Exchange (CSCSE) will hold the 16th China International Education Exhibition Tour (CIEET 2011) in seven major cities in China (Beijing, Dalian, Xi'an, Shanghai, Nanjing, Wuhan and Guangzhou) from March 12 to 27, 2011

Click to expand...

SHENZHEN, CHINA - MARCH 13: Marshalls on the first tee during the final round of the ISPS Handa Senior World Championship presented by Mission Hills China and played on the World Cup Course, Mission Hills on March 13, 2011 in Shenzhen, Guangdong.

Click to expand...

Members of the Chinese rescue team prepare to depart to aid Japan in the wake of the recent earthquake, which unleashed a devastating 10-metre (30-foot) tsunami that washed away homes and tossed ships inland, at the airport in Beijing on March 13, 2011. Premier Wen Jiabao expressed his 'deep sympathy' to the Japanese government and people, and offered any 'necessary help' to its neighbour, the foreign ministry said.

Click to expand...

A 15-member Chinese rescue team arrive at Haneda Airport in Tokyo， Japan， March 13， 2011. The Chinese rescue team arrived in Japan Sunday for quake relief operations. The rescuers will immediately head for quake-hit areas to search for survivors from Friday's great earthquake and ensuing tsunami. (Xinhua/Feng Wuyong)

Click to expand...

Mao Xinyu, the grandson of late Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong, walks to a bus in Tiananmen Square after the closing session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in Beijing Sunday, March 13, 2011.

Click to expand...

A journalist jokingly poses for picture outside the Great Hall of the People while waiting delegates during the closing session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in Beijing Sunday, March 13, 2011.

Click to expand...

Models pose along side cars in the 8th Hainan International Automotive Industry Exhibition in Haikou, capital of south China's Hainan Province, March 10, 2011. The four-day exhibition opened on Thursday, attracting over 100 brands from home and abroad.[Xinhua/Hou Jiansen]

Click to expand...

Already, last year saw a wave of large-scale strikes over pay and working conditions, a sign of an increasingly confident labor force. But wide-scale upheaval is unlikely as long as the migrants continue to make money and feel they have opportunities, predicts Leslie T. Chang, author of "Factory Girls," which examines the lives of young workers.

"Some of these people will become middle class and some will become a new urban working class," she says. "But they are very different from the traditional working class associated with state-owned enterprises. This is a new working class that's very independent, very mobile and really on its own."

It's impossible to say exactly how many migrants have settled in cities, because of their transient nature and still shallow urban roots. But statistics show growing numbers in the cities, coupled with new migrants leaving the countryside every year.

The migrants themselves hesitate to say they'll never return to the farm; without job security, their small plots of land are their only insurance.

Still, it's clear China's villages are slowly dying.

When Li returned home to her misty mountain village for the recent Lunar New Year holiday, there were fewer children setting off firecrackers and fewer dots of light from houses on the adjacent hillside.

One by one, families in southwest China's Sanxing village are moving to the nearby town or even further away, leaving plots covered in weeds between tended patches of vegetables.

"Over there, there's four empty houses, there's a lot of them like that," Li says, gesturing past the dirt road next to her family's three-story brick home, which was built with her and her siblings' factory earnings. "The ones who came back for the holiday, they're living in town, they don't come back to the village anymore."

Li makes the trip to Sanxing once a year at most. After a two-day bus trip, it's a 40-minute ride on the back of a motorcycle along a deeply rutted dirt path. When it rains, the only way to get to the clutch of 26 families is on foot. Here, her family farms on less than 1/6th of an acre (1/15th of a hectare), not enough to feed even themselves.

"Of course I want the young folks to stay in the city, it's better there. It's hard living in the country," says 56-year-old Li Weishu, her father, noting that only grandparents and small children remain. "We don't have much land, this is a mountain area and there isn't enough to live on."

A visitor might see rustic charm in the sturdy hand-knitted clogs worn by elderly women, green fields of winter vegetables, homemade salt pork hanging from kitchen rafters and cooking stoves fired by dried corn husks.

"No," Li says, a bite in her voice. "This place is backward and poor."

She has lost her taste for the spicy food of her hometown and prefers the milder flavors of southern Chinese cooking. Sometimes she slips into Mandarin instead of her native dialect, prompting her mother to question when she will forget her own parents.

At the factory, Li's day clicks ahead with every unit of 12 pieces. She beams as factory manager Miao Linglin hands her a thin stack of 100 yuan notes. Most of it will be sent home, and after living expenses, there's not much left for herself.

Anyway, there's no time for cruising Dongguan's noisy shopping arcades. After a 14-hour work day the women rush back to the dorm to get hot water that's only available for 20 minutes a day.

Li, parked on her stool in front of the sewing machine, dreams of a future in which she owns a home in the city and has a stable job working only eight hours a day.

"Even though I'm from the country, I want to improve my life and be like people in the city," Li says. "Everyone yearns for that kind of life. I yearn for that kind of life too."

(Agencies)

Click to expand...

By TOM HAYS, Associated Press Tom Hays, Associated Press – 1 hr 26 mins ago

NEW YORK – Passengers and witnesses to a horrific crash that sheared the top off a bus and killed 14 people told investigators that the driver's account of getting clipped by a tractor-trailer didn't match up to what they felt and saw before the vehicle slid off the road and into a sign pole.

Driver Ophadell Williams had told police that his World Wide Travel bus was hit just as it crossed the New York City line early Saturday on a trip from the Mohegan Sun casino in in Connecticut.

But passengers said Williams had already swerved at times to the right for no reason before the accident, a law enforcement official said Sunday. The official wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the probe and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The bus was returning to Manhattan's Chinatown after a quick overnight trip to the casino. The official said that passengers said they didn't feel anything hit them and that other motorists on Interstate 95 said they didn't see the bus get hit. The official said police spoke to the tractor-trailer driver, who said he was following the bus.

Williams remained hospitalized in stable condition Sunday and has not commented publicly. His family could not be reached.

As many as 20 passengers were treated at hospitals following the accident. Nine remained hospitalized, including the bus driver, at St. Barnabas Hospital and Jacobi Medical Center. Most were in critical condition.

Officials at Jacobi were still trying to identify one passenger, an Asian man in his 50s, spokeswoman Barbara DeIorio said.

"He's very injured. He's not able to communicate yet," she said, adding that the man was in the surgical intensive care unit.

The 14 victims — eight men and six women — all died of blunt force trauma, said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the New York City medical examiner's office. She said the office was working with family members to identify them.

The National Transportation Safety Board has interviewed two passengers from the bus, but it hasn't spoken to the bus driver or the driver of the truck, Vice Chairman Christopher Hart said at a news conference late Sunday.

He said the investigation was still in its early stages, but the NTSB plans to talk to the bus company to see what kind of fatigue management the company has in place. Investigators will also look into the casino's records to see whether the driver checked into a room there.

The NTSB will analyze three devices: a camera mounted in the bus facing the passengers; an engine control module, which may tell how fast the bus was going; and a GPS tracking device from the tractor-trailer, said Hart.

Some of the 31 passengers were still asleep when the bus crashed at 5:35 a.m. Saturday. The bus scraped along the guardrail for 300 feet, toppled and crashed into the support pole for a highway sign indicating the exit for the Hutchinson Parkway. The pole knifed through the bus front to back along the window line, peeling the roof off all the way to the back tires.

The bus was one of scores that travel daily between Chinatown and the Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casinos in southeastern Connecticut.

Mohegan Sun, in Uncasville, Conn., has estimated a fifth of its business comes from Asian spending and caters to Chinese-American gamblers. Its website has a Chinese-language section offering gaming and bus promotions.

The trips between New York City's Chinatown and regional casinos are popular, said Eddie Chiu, who runs the Lin Sing Association, a community outreach group.

He said in the past three years, there have been a handful of serious accidents involving discount buses taking people from New York's Chinese community to casinos.

"The drivers tell me that they're often very tired," he said, adding that salaries are low and drivers work long hours.

Eric Brodie, a spokesman for the operator of the bus, World Wide Travel, said company officials met with NTSB and state police investigators and were cooperating fully. He declined to comment further.

The accident tossed passengers all around the bus, with most people hurled to the front of the bus on impact, authorities said.

Many of the passengers on the bus were Chinatown residents. They ranged in age from 20 to 50, officials said.

Chinatown community organizations offered to help victims' families cope with their loss.

Oanfa Quan, who runs a company that provides wigs and medical prostheses, said she was working with the Lin Sing Association to provide wigs in case some of the victims need them for burial.

"Usually the family wants it for their own peace of mind," she said. "Even if the casket is closed, they still want to know that their loved one looks the way they were prior to the accident."

___

Associated Press writers Verena Dobnik in New York and Karen Matthews in New Rochelle, N.Y., contributed

Click to expand...