Woman honored for saving bus passengers

A WOMAN who stopped two buses, including one en route to Shanghai, from heading to Shuibuya Highway ended up saving 80 people from being crushed under a rockslide on Monday in Changyang County, Hubei Province, Xinhua news agency reported today.

Fang Mingyu, 36, declined a 500-yuan (US$68) reward from the government. But the water station she runs was renamed "Brave Resident Helps Others" in honor of her good deeds, the report said.

Fang's water station was 50 meters from the mountain where the rockslide occurred. She was adding water to a truck's radiator when she heard a loud, strange sound from the mountain.

Then she saw a bus driving towards the mountain. Fang ran to stop the bus. Fang and her cousin shouted: "Stop! The mountain is going to collapse," and the bus stopped, according to the report.

Huge rocks soon fell onto the road only 10 meters ahead of the bus, the report said.

Fang stopped another bus before she was knocked to the ground by the strong wind brought by the rockslide.

The first coach carried 43 passengers and was en route to Wuhan, capital of Hubei. The other had 37 people, including four children, and was on the way to Shanghai from Chongqing, the report said.

The driver of the first bus, Liu Shouan, told Xinhua that "If it was not for Fang, we could have been smashed by the rockslide."

The rockslide occurred at the Shuibuya Hydropower Station highway in Changyang County, Hubei. The 1,000 cubic-meter rock pile slid 1.3 kilometers from Langshui Highway. No casualties have been reported thus far.

A landslide near a rail tunnel killed 35 people last month in Badong County, Hubei. It also cut traffic on State Highway 318.

The 318 has not reopened and vehicles were using the Qingjiang Shuibuya Hydropower Station highway as a detour. Traffic resumed to normal on the Shuibuya highway today.