Egged and Press Are Silent After Jerusalem Bus Accident

 * Picture by Arutz 7

On the 9th of July a friend was hit by an Egged bus in Jerusalem (Seriously!) The only pictures I could find were in Arutz 7 along with a small report. There have been no further updates.

The accident, involving three Egged buses took place across from the Central Bus station in Jerusalem.

Our buses have a bad habit of "stacking" at the stops. From what I could gather, two buses were one in front of the other at the curb (with a fair distance between them). The third bus pulled up, stopped in the traffic lane and opened the doors for people to enter and exit. The people at the curb, including my friend, started walking between the first two buses towards the open doors. For reasons not yet known, the front bus rolled back causing the majority of the people to scatter. My friend was somehow caught by the bus backing up~thrown against the second bus and ended up in the space between two of the buses~around the middle of the above photo. We are guessing that her shirt was snagged, and when it ripped she was "dropped". This may well have saved her life.

There was one other injured girl. She was flung up and crushed between the two buses (below the guy straddling the tops of the buses in the photo). According to Arutz 7, they had to have firefighters come to release her. My friend said that when her eyes began to focus she was looking up at the girl who appeared to be suspended in mid-air, as if she was swimming. She said that her first thought was "this can't be real".

I stayed with her in hospital and for the next  week. Over those days my friend revealed that immediately on gaining her senses she felt like it was the end of the world, as for some moments she heard no sound, no screams, no sirens...just silence. She said it was as if there was nobody left but herself and this poor girl.

My friend's right arm was scraped raw above and below the elbow (nasty looking and very painful!) Her other elbow is a huge black bruise and her back has multiple bruises. The shirt appears to have dragged over her tummy creating huge "burn" marks. Her laptop was crushed (to death) and the case ripped. Her clothing had to be cut off and the scraps were unceremoniously thrown in the garbage.

On the positive side, she is moving around and they say there is nothing broken. I suspect she will be in a lot of pain for some time to come...but considering the circumstances it is a miracle that this is the extent of her injuries!

There was no information about the injured young woman, other than she was about nineteen, and a tourist~possibly from Alaska. When we asked the investigating police officer in the hospital how she was doing, his only answer was "lo tov", which means "not good". We are praying that she makes a complete recovery.

Shearim Will Be Updating But Here is What She Learned:
She went to the Hospital to ask about the injured girl and was fortunate to be able to speak her mother. The girl's name is Jordan, she was in surgery at the time and will require more. She learned that once the parents were informed of the accident, they were left to their own devices to make their way to Israel. When they arrived they had to find a place to stay close to the hospital (unassisted). To my knowledge, "nobody has even bothered to speak to them!" Can you imagine how they must feel~not speaking Hebrew, a seriously injured child and all alone thousands of miles from home!! Apparently, Egged is very good at sweeping things under the carpet and this is par for the course for them. My question is: Why are the Media Silent?  There were hundreds of people around and it is as if nothing happened! This is a disgrace, and a shame on our country. While the media may be hushed up, bloggers are Not! I plan to follow and post along with Shearim as things unfold. I urge any bloggers who are interested to Link To or Contact Shearim to spread the story. 

Do go to Shearim and view the multiple posts to date (in descending order):
http://shearim.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/update-egged-bus-accident-july-9-2012.html
http://shearim.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/recovering.html
http://shearim.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/back-after-accident.html
http://shearim.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/getting-healthy.html
http://shearim.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/no-blogging-for-while.html

While you are there be sure to check out the other posts~worth the time...