KATHMANDU, Nepal — A bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drove off a key highway Friday in Nepal, leaving several people injured or missing.
The bus veered off the Prithvi highway and rolled toward a fast-flowing river, stopping on the rocky bank.
The top part of the bus had been ripped but the wreckage did not plunge into the Marsyangdi river.
Some four dozen were on board the bus, according to police official Deepak Kumar Raya. Fourteen of the 29 people pulled out of the bus were unconscious and were rushed to hospitals nearby.
Police and army rescuers were helping to pull people from the wreckage near Abukhaireni, a town about 120 kilometers (75 miles) west of the capital, Kathmandu.
The bus from neighboring Indian town of Gorakhpur was heading toward the capital Kathmandu from the resort town of Pokhara on Friday when it drove off the highway midway in the journey.
Last month , two buses were swept by landslides not too far from Friday’s accident site. Of the 65 people on board those two buses only three survived and only about half the bodies were recovered. The wreckage of those buses have not been found yet but authorities have continued to search.
Bus accidents in Nepal are mostly due to poorly maintained roads and vehicles and much of the country is covered by mountains with narrow roads.