Posted on 03/12/2004 8:03:29 AM PST by nuconvert
Two Dead in Military Bus Crash in South Carolina; Part of Convoy on Way to Ceremony
Mar 12, 2004
The Associated Press
GARDENS CORNER, S.C. (AP) - A bus carrying Navy personnel struck another vehicle Friday and at least two people were killed and several others injured, authorities said. Details of the 8 a.m. accident about 50 miles west of Charleston were not immediately clear. State public safety officials said only that the bus collided with another vehicle. It was also not immediately known whether the victims were on the bus or in the other vehicle.
Charleston Naval Weapons Station spokeswoman Susan Piedfort said she understood a Navy bus, one of a caravan of four or five on the way to a ceremony, collided with a tractor-trailer truck.
She said the convoy was traveling from the guided missile destroyer William Pinckney in Charleston to Beaufort National Cemetery for a wreath-laying ceremony honoring the destroyer's namesake. The ceremony was part of events leading up to the upcoming formal commission of the destroyer.
Pinckney, who is credited with saving the life of a shipmate during a Japanese attack on the carrier Enterprise in 1942, died in 1975.
Another ceremony, scheduled to take place on the ship itself, was canceled, Piedfort said.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.