ANOTHER TRAGEDY

Accident in Colon kills family of five

08-17-2009 | DAVID PEREZ/ANA BOLENA AYARZA

periodistas@laestrella.com.pa

Panama Star PANAMA. Panama hasn't finish mourning the loss of 24 lives from the Pacora accident when tragedy strikes again.

Five members of a family died in a fatal accident in the early hours of Saturday morning when a trailer hit a dump truck in Colon province between the towns of San Juan and Quebrada Lopez.

The truck was parked at the side of dark Boyd Roosevelt Avenue when a trailer, driven by Javier Rios, hit it from the back.

The trailer driver and his wife, Leida Burbua, survived the crash but his sister in law, Liseika Burbua de Gomez, her husband, Ariel Gomez, and their two children aged 4 and 10, died at the scene.

A third child, Liseika’s nephew, Rafael Gonzalez, died on the way to the Manuel Amador Guerrero hospital.

The truck driver, Rigoberto Polanco, was uninjured.

He had driven to the site to pick up electricity cables that had fallen down earlier when a car lost control and knocked down a lamppost.

No one was hurt in this first accident. Two major accidents during the weekend make the need for a renewal of transit laws imperative.