MANILA, Philippines – Stories of misadventures in foreign places were nothing new to Annemiek Verwegen, a backpacker from the Netherlands.

She had travelled around Asia before, and for this trip to Sagada, she was with a friend who was a veteran when it came to backpacking around Southeast Asia.

But her first visit to the Philippines is a nightmare that happened too quickly, but won’t go away.

Annemiek Verwegen is one of the survivors of a bus accident that claimed the lives of at least 14 people on-site after a GV Florida Transportation bus fell into a ravine in Bontoc, Mountain Province.

The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB), which monitors and issues franchises for public buses in the Philippines, later discovered the ill-fated bus was not authorized to operate. It has since suspended the bus company for 30 days.

The pink, ill-fated bus

It was early morning Friday, February 7, when Annemiek and her friend, Anne van de Ven, boarded a pink Florida bus from Banaue in Ifugao province en route to Sagada in the Mountain Province. They figured it was safe because it was the bus the local tourism office recommended.

The bus was jam-packed. There were no seats left, and even the center aisle was filled with boxes, bags, and a toilet haphazardly put in a box. But the two managed to find a spot – Annemiek on the aisle floor, the toilet behind her, and Anne, lying on her backpack.

Less than an hour later, the bus took a 15-minute stop. One seat was free, and Anne took it because she needed to rest. Annemiek now thinks it was that decision that ultimately spared her life.

Fifteen minutes later, everything started to go wrong.

She stood up to see what was going on, but still couldn’t understand a thing. Anne wondered if there was something wrong with the bus brakes. “I said no, that cannot be true,” recalled Annemiek. 

But the bus only went faster and faster as it went downhill.

‘It will be fine, it will be fine’

After Sagada, the duo would go and visit a beach or two in Palawan, where Anne would also meet up with a guy she fell in love with. The Palawan trip would never push through.

They were already in Bontoc when the bus seemed to be speeding faster and faster downhill. The other passengers were starting to panic, but the bus still managed to go around 3 or 4 turns before one last turn.

A spokesman of GV Florida Transport said in a Manila Bulletin report that the bus driver, Edgar Renon, “miscalculated his move due to ‘extra heavy fog'” along the Banaue-Bontoc road. Initial reports from investigators on site pointed to human error or loose brakes to be behind the accident.

Annemiek doesn’t think it was the bus driver’s fault. There were clear skies around them when the accident happened, she said. 

“When people were panicking, I didn’t think. I kept saying in my head: it will be fine, it will be fine. Nothing wrong will happen,” Annemiek said. “The bus began to roll, and it was horrible.”

Once Annemiek regained her bearings, she began to look around. There was blood on her clothes, but she felt fine. Around her, her co-passengers were injured but alive. Anne, however, could not be found.

Shattered dreams

“Immediately I thought: where is my friend? So I started screaming and I didn’t hear a thing,” she said.

Anne, it later turned out, was flung deeper down into the ravine. Annemiek climbed down, carefully putting aside a piece of glass from the bus that lay precariously close to another man.

“Then I saw my friend, and so many other people. You could see they were not alive anymore,” she said.

She didn’t want to leave Anne even when rescuers arrived on site 15-20 minutes after the accident. But her injuries could not wait. She was driven to a Bontoc hospital, where locals tracked down a Dutch couple living in the town. The couple contacted the Dutch Embassy, and Annemiek was later transferred to a Manila hospital.

Officials of the bus company told Annemiek a representative would come to talk to her, but 5 days later, she has yet to hear a peep. 

Money isn’t a worry, but Annemiek is eager to return home to the Netherlands as soon as possible. But she worries for travelers – local and foreign – who might one day take the same trip to the Mountain Province.

She is also worried that the bus company will get away scot-free.

One survivor, who requested not to be named, is worried the bus company won’t deliver on its promise to pay for hospital costs of the victims. A “company representative” has already seen victims staying in hospitals around Bontoc, but while their bills are being paid, the extent of financial support they can expect has been unclear.  

“In the Netherlands, there are rules. You can’t run a bus company unless it’s safe. I know things can be different in places like the Philippines, but there must be some control over it,” Annemiek said. (READ: Understaffed LTFRB to audit public buses nationwide)

The accident in Bontoc comes barely two months after a Don Mariano city bus fell off the elevated Metro Manila Skyway, crushing a van plying the West Service Road of the South Luzon Expressway. At least 18 people died on site. 

She later learned from Bontoc locals in the hospital that other bus routes were a safer option. Had she known, she said she wouldn’t have minded a longer travel time if it meant they would be safe. – Rappler.com