Three buses on fire in Sydney in three months
Fire suppressant systems an urgent priority
On Tuesday a bus full of passengers caught fire on Parramatta road – the third in a string of similar incidents affecting STA buses in NSW over the past three months.
The RTBU is calling for all buses in NSW to be urgently fitted with fire suppressant systems before a serious injury or death occurs.
RTBU Bus and Tram Division Secretary Chris Preston said that this has been an ongoing issue for years but only some buses had been fitted with fire suppressant systems.
“It is beyond belief that we are still seeing our public buses catching on fire on our roads – putting passengers, drivers, pedestrians and other road users at enormous risk,” said Mr Preston.
“We’ve been calling for all buses to be fitted with these fire safety systems for at least three years but we’re still waiting.”
Channel 7 news reports the RTBU’s concerns
“The State Transit Authority did take our concerns on board and they retrofitted 350 of the gas buses and all newer buses.
“But this is a widespread problem in NSW and the State Government must make funds available for the retrofitting of the more than 1,500 buses which currently do not have a fire suppressant system.
“The State Government owes bus drivers and the travelling public an apology because they have known about this issue for some time but have not provided the funding to address it.
“Without these fire safety systems extremely dangerous situations such as we saw on Parramatta road will keep on occurring.
“The NSW Government needs to immediately act on this before someone suffers from a serious injury or even death.”