Friday afternoon’s crash in the Little Bay/Belair area (see Saturday paper) other than backing up traffic caught the attention in several ways. To begin with, it was a head-on collision that caused considerable material damage and left both drivers trapped inside the two wrecks.
The latter may indicate speeding on this hilly and curvy road with various relatively hazardous intersections, including the entrance to Divi Little Bay Beach Resort. Many serious accidents have occurred there over the years, which should be enough reason for motorists to go slowly and exercise care.
One of the vehicles involved was a bus not only clearly out of its route, but reportedly carrying 17 cruise tourists. The assumption is that it was being used as an illicit taxi at the time.
Luckily the guests appeared to be unhurt and still managed to make it back to the ship on time for the scheduled departure. If the outcome had been worse there could be an issue with their insurance coverage, as the bus was obviously not in compliance with its owner’s permit.
The intention is not to single out the driver of Bus 142. In addition, some suggest these visitors may have indeed chosen to take the bus rather than a taxi and perhaps were charged only the regular bus fare.
Regardless, deviating from the route most likely to reach the harbour more quickly and less in sight via Link One was wrong and really a bad idea. Public transport operators must always keep in mind that they are responsible for the safety of their passengers.
Gypsy taxis and buses continue to be a major problem in St. Maarten. Effective enforcement is difficult also because of the open border with the French side, but nevertheless highly important.
To better understand the risk of allowing these practices, readers need only remember the so-called “gypsy murders” when two foreign criminals drove around in a minivan posing as taxi to rob, rape and kill several persons. Not that more frequent controls would have necessarily prevented that, but they might help discourage people from making use of these illegal transportation modes and therefore limit their chances of ultimately becoming victims.
