The recent accident at Friendship, East Bank Demerara in which a power transformer rolled off a truck and hit a minibus has claimed another life.
Sixty-six-year-old Kenneth Welch of Ituni, Upper Demerara died late Sunday night in the Intensive Care Unit of the Georgetown Public Hospital.
Welch was a passenger in the Route 43 minibus being driven by Trevor Charles of Craig, East Bank Demerara. Charles died shortly after the accident in which two Guyana Power and Light (GPL) Company transformers that were being transported on a Guyana National Industrial Corporation (GNIC) truck rolled off near a turn at Friendship; one hit the bus and the other rolled off the road.
Welch’s daughter Vanessa told Stabroek News yesterday that following the accident he was taken to the Diamond Diagnostic Centre and then to the city medical institution where he was admitted to the open ward. His leg was broken in two places, she said.
She said he was transferred to the High Dependency Unit after his condition worsened. On Friday last, he was transferred to the ICU in an unconscious state; he died without regaining consciousness.
The man’s daughter said the nurse told her that he passed away some time after 10 pm following two heart attacks.
Asked if he sustained head injuries during the accident, Vanessa said a CT scan done at a private hospital indicated that he had not, but the doctors at the hospital gave her conflicting reasons as to why he was unconscious.
She said she was told that it was because of a blood clot from his broken leg; then she was told it was because of fat from the same leg. She said the doctor later discovered that her father had an injury to his stomach.
“I feel bad about my father and right now we are having some difficulty with funeral arrangements,” a distraught Vanessa told this newspaper yesterday.
She said she believed GNIC and GPL should assist them in some way.
Vanessa also informed this newspaper that her twin nephews and a niece were also injured when the transformer fell on the bus. She said Romanio and Robert Welch, both age eight years old and seven-year-old Rianna Welch, sustained broken limbs and were hospitalized but have since been released and are staying with her.
The woman explained that her father and his three grandchildren were on their way to Georgetown to do some shopping when tragedy struck. They were scheduled to return to Ituni the following day.
Two Fridays ago, just before 3 pm, the GNIC low-bed truck was transporting two of GPL’s transformers to the Garden of Eden site for another shipping company, when as it came off a steep turn, the two transformers fell off. One rolled onto the roadway and into the thick bush on the parapet and the other hit the driver’s side of the minibus Charles was driving, before coming to rest a few feet away. The bus was headed to Georgetown from Linden.
Charles, 41, was pronounced dead on arrival at the Diamond Diagnostic Centre and several injured persons including the Welches were transferred from there to the Georgetown Hospital.
The truck driver was arrested and taken to the Grove Police Station. He was subsequently released on station bail.
GNIC has since said it was not at fault over the incident, but would offer assistance to Charles’s relatives and the survivors. GPL said it would not comment until the police have completed their investigations.
When contacted last week GNIC’S Chief Executive Officer Clinton Williams told this newspaper that his company was merely doing DSL (a subsidiary of Demerara Distillers Limited – DDL) Shipping Wharf, a favour.
He explained that a shipment of GPL transformers arrived at that company’s wharf and was transported to Sophia. Two were left on the container truck since they had to be transported to GPL’s Garden of Eden site.
According to Williams, after hours of trying to move the truck his company was called to lend assistance and did so.
He said that from the information he received he received two buses were trying to overtake each other on the Friendship road and the driver of his truck swerved to the left to avoid a head-on collision and because of the momentum the two transformers fell from the truck, one hitting the minibus in the process. He added that the other bus disappeared. Williams said that as far as he knew the driver would have secured the transformers on the truck. There had been earlier reports that they were not strapped to the truck and that was what caused them to fall off.
The company’s Human Resources Manager Alan Johnson had informed this newspaper that they were instrumental in offering assistance to the Welch’s family members and that they had contacted Charles’s family and conveyed their condolences. He said they would have been giving money to the funeral parlour to help with burial expenses but this newspaper could not ascertain yesterday if this had been done. Charles was laid to rest on Saturday.
Meanwhile, at a press conference on Friday to discuss an increase in electricity tariffs, Chairman of GPL’s Board of Directors told reporters that the company preferred to await the completion of the police investigations before making any further statements on the accident. Brassington pointed out that even though the transformer was owned by GPL, it was being transported by another company hired by GPL. He called the incident very unfortunate and said it was engaging the company’s attention adding that the question of insurance coverage has also been raised by the parties concerned and is being discussed further.
