VALLETTA, Malta (AP) — An open-top double-decker tourist bus slammed into a low-hanging tree branch in Malta on Monday, killing two people and injuring 50 others, including a dozen children.

The accident happened in Zurrieq, a popular tourist destination just outside the capital that is famous for its ruins and "blue grotto."

Police said the two passengers who died were a 37-year-old Spanish woman and a 62-year-old Belgian man. They and most of the people injured were sitting on the top deck when the bus hit the branch.

Health Minister Chris Fearne said most of the passengers hailed from Belgium or Britain, though police said the seriously injured also included a German and an Italian.

Twelve of the 50 people hurt were children, two of whom suffered critical injuries.

The 24-year-old bus driver was not hurt.

Hop-on, hop-off buses are common for sightseeing in major cities in the United States and Europe.

In November 2015, 19 people were injured when a double-decker tour bus in San Francisco crashed into pedestrians, vehicles and construction scaffolding.

San Francisco police concluded the driver of the open-top bus had been going too fast. </s> Sixteen people have been taken to hospital after a crash between a double decker bus and a lorry in Cambridgeshire.

Emergency crews were called to the A47 in Wisbech at around 7.30am on Tuesday and pictures showed a bus had smashed into the side of a lorry.

Patients were transferred to hospital following the incident at Thorney Road in Guyhirn, the East of England Ambulance Service said.

Cambridgeshire Police confirmed 20 people had been hurt in total, nine of which had serious injuries.

Police officers were still at the scene this morning and warned drivers the road would be closed "for some time".

The East of England Ambulance service initially declared it as a "major incident" because of the number of patients involved, but were stood down at 9.50am. </s> Up to 16 people have been seriously injured after a lorry collided with a double decker bus in a “major incident” in the Cambridgeshire Fens today.

The HGV and bus crashed on the A47 in Wisbech today at about 07:30 BST. Emergency services rushed to the scene and are treating patients, some with serious injuries.

An East of England Ambulance Service spokesman added: “We are currently attending a serious road traffic incident in Thorney Road, Guyhirn.

“The East of England Ambulance Service Trust has currently dispatched seven ambulance crews, three ambulance officers, two rapid response vehicles, a Hazardous Area Response Team (HART) and Magpas Air Ambulance to the scene where the crew are caring for several seriously injured patients. </s> Multiple people are feared dead and at least 31 people were injured after a bus collided with a truck in southern Germany on Monday.

The bus, which is believed to have been carrying 48 tourist pensioners, burst into flames following the collision on the A9 motorway around 7am local time near the town of Muenchberg, north of Munich in the German state of Bavaria.

German police have voiced fears that at least 17 people remain unaccounted for after the incident and may have been killed.

A German government spokesperson said: "Unfortunately numerous people - a tour group from (the eastern German state of) Saxony - lost their lives in this burning bus," according to Fairfax.

A spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she had become aware of the crash with "great dismay", according to AFP news.

"Our thoughts and condolences go to the victims and their family members, as well as to the injured. We hope that those who have been rescued will recover from their injuries," the spokesman said.

An emergency response was launched following the crash, including helicopters and ambulances in order to treat the injured and the highway was closed in both directions. </s> BERLIN — A German bus crashed into a metal post on a highway in southern Switzerland Sunday, leaving one woman dead and another 14 people injured, police said.

The bus was heading south with 25 people on board when the accident happened on the A2 highway at Sigirino, near Lugano — along a major route across the Alps from northern Europe to Italy.

It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the bus to plow into the post, wrecking the front of the vehicle.

The bus had set off from the German city of Cologne on Saturday evening and was headed for Assisi in Italy, Johannes Huebner of bus travel group RDA, who was co-ordinating emergency plans for the company involved, told the German news agency dpa.

A group of young people and two drivers were on board, according to Ticino canton (state) police.

A police statement late Sunday said a 27-year-old German woman died of injuries sustained in the crash.

The statement said two people had serious but not life-threatening injuries, eight more had “medium” injuries and another four were lightly hurt. </s> The Hamburg Fire Department issued a press release concerning the accident on Monday afternoon. They report that the crash occurred when the sightseeing bus packed with tourists collided with the car at high speed, resulting in four serious injuries and leaving the passengers of the car and bus trapped in their vehicles. As of yet, the cause of the accident is unknown.

A large number of personnel from the Hamburg Fire Department, Bundeswehr Rescue Service and the German Red Cross were immediately sent to the scene, where first responders treated the four individuals with severe injuries.

Seven passengers on the tourist bus were also found to have suffered minor injuries, and were also treated within the ambulance of the Hamburg Fire Department at the scene of the crash.

The Hamburg Fire Department said that the four seriously-injured persons, who were all riding in the car involved in the crash, were only able to be freed from the vehicle through the use of a hydraulic cutting machine.

After they were rescued, all four were cared for by emergency attendants on-scene before being transported to the hospital’s emergency room via helicopter. They are currently being treated by local physicians.

Among those brought to the hospital was a pregnant passenger from the sightseeing tour bus, who the Hamburg Fire Department believes was unharmed in the incident, but examined as a precautionary measure.

Hamburg’s Fire Department praised the response of emergency personnel in their press release, saying that “first responders provided and cared for the 11 injured... in an exemplary manner and effectively supported the rescue measures of the Hamburg Fire Brigade.”

Among the first responders present at the crash was a Mönchengladbach Fire Department employee, who was visiting Hamburg for the Easter holiday.

The accident itself required a mass-effort on the part of Hamburg’s emergency response team, and involved more than six ambulances, a fire service crane and a rescue helicopter.

READ MORE: Hamburg named German state with most congested motorways </s> Nineteen people were killed when a double-decker bus crashed Saturday in the Tai Po area of Hong Kong, according to Hong Kong police.

The accident left at 65 people injured, police said Sunday.

Images from the scene showed the passenger bus lying on its side. The top of the bus appeared to have been torn off, local media reported.

Police said Sunday the driver of the bus, a 30-year-old man, was arrested on dangerous driving charges and was being detained as the investigation continues.

Hong Kong’s double-decker buses can accommodate around 140 seated and standing passengers, depending upon the model.

Tai Po is in Hong Kong’s New Territories on the mainland.

The bus crash happened near a large horse racecourse where special arrangements had been made due to expected heavy traffic. </s> BERLIN (AP) — A German bus crashed into a metal post on a highway in southern Switzerland Sunday, leaving one woman dead and another 14 people injured, police said. The bus was heading south with…

BERLIN (AP) — A German bus crashed into a metal post on a highway in southern Switzerland Sunday, leaving one woman dead and another 14 people injured, police said.

The bus was heading south with 25 people on board when the accident happened on the A2 highway at Sigirino, near Lugano — along a major route across the Alps from northern Europe to Italy.

It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the bus to plow into the post, wrecking the front of the vehicle.

The bus had set off from the German city of Cologne on Saturday evening and was headed for Assisi in Italy, Johannes Huebner of bus travel group RDA, who was coordinating emergency plans for the company involved, told the German news agency dpa.

A group of young people and two drivers were on board, according to Ticino canton (state) police.

A police statement late Sunday said a 27-year-old German woman died of injuries sustained in the crash.

The statement said two people had serious but not life-threatening injuries, eight more had “medium” injuries and another four were lightly hurt.

Copyright © 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed. </s> At least 18 people have died after a double-decker bus crashed on Saturday evening in Hong Kong, police have said.

Local media reports quoted passengers as saying the crowded vehicle tipped over after it had been traveling too fast.

A police spokeswoman said 15 men and three women were killed in the accident near the town of Tai Po in the northern New Territories.

Nearly 50 people were injured and taken to hospitals, including 19 in serious condition, the Hospital Authority said.

The South China Morning Post said it was Hong Kong's worst road accident since a 2003 bus crash that killed 21.

Photos and videos published by social media showed the gold-coloured bus lying on its side with its roof torn off, while emergency workers treated injured passengers nearby.

It appeared to have slid on its side and hit a lamppost which cut through the front of the vehicle.

Rescuers were attempting to reach passengers trapped in the wreckage, although police were unable to say how many were still inside.

'It was much faster than I normally felt in a bus,' an injured passenger told the South China Morning Post's online edition.

'And then it was like the tyre slipped, and the bus turned. It was really chaotic in the bus. People fell on one another and got tossed from side to side,' he said.

Earlier passengers complained to the driver who was reportedly 10 minutes late.

He then kept speeding up before the bus crashed, the Apple Daily reported, quoting injured passengers at the scene.

'(The driver was) intentionally using the bus to throw a tantrum,' another injured passenger told the Oriental Daily.

Lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting of the Democratic Party urged the government to investigate bus designs, 'especially with the upper deck of buses having been repeatedly torn off in accidents, posing a serious threat to passengers on the upper level'.

The Chinese city promotes its public transport system as one of the best infrastructures in the world but fatal accidents do occasionally happen:
• In 2003 a double-decker bus collided with a truck and plunged from a bridge, killing 21 people
• In 2008, 18 people were killed in another bus crash
• In April 2017 14 people were injured when a double-decker tram tipped over, with a 23-year-old driver later arrested for dangerous driving

The safety of Hong Kong's waterways has also remained under scrutiny since 39 people were killed when a high-speed ferry and a pleasure boat crashed in 2012.
A double-decker sightseeing bus collides with a car in Hamburg, Germany, leaving eleven injured.