A passenger bus slammed into a broken-down truck and burst into flames, killing at least 36 people Sunday in southern Mexico, the Veracruz state government reported, according to Reuters.
The federal highway department, which earlier gave the death toll as 34, said the three-axle bus was on a highway in the area of Acayucan when it struck a five-axle tractor-trailer owned by a milk protein company that had broken down and was parked along the roadside, Reuters reported.
A communique from the state civil defense agency said the victims were business people from the region who were travelling from the Tabasco state capital of Villahermosa to Mexico City, according to Reuters.
Both state and federal officials said that four people survived the crash, which occurred shortly after midnight in the southeastern state of Veracruz, Reuters reported.
The agency's emergency director, Ricardo Maza Limon, said that victims apparently burned to death inside the bus, which was so badly charred that the tires melted and the markings on its sides were unreadable, Reuters reported.
"Apart from being hit, the bus also caught fire, making the job of identifying bodies difficult," Veracruz Governor Javier Duarte said on local television, according to Reuters.
The truck was "badly parked on the motorway" when the bus hit, the statement said, citing federal police reports, Reuters reported. The bus was completely consumed by the fire, it added, raising the death toll from the accident from 33 reported earlier.
Bus crashes and road accidents occur frequently in Mexico, taking a heavy death toll each year, according to Reuters. In 2012, at least 43 people died when a truck hit a bus in Veracruz, and just a couple of months later more than 30 others were killed in a separate accident in Guerrero state.
