UPDATE | Identities of two killed in major St Ann crash released

The two persons killed in a mass-casualty motor vehicle crash on the Llandovery main road in St Ann on Sunday morning have been identified. 

They are Kermit Grant of Aboukir in the parish, and Jennifer Palmer, 56, of Mount Edgecombe in Runaway Bay, also in St Ann. 

Grant was the driver of the Toyota Hiace public passenger bus, one of two vehicles involved in the crash. The other vehicle was a Toyota Coaster bus. 

Palmer was travelling in the Hiace.

Twenty-seven persons were taken to the St Ann's Bay Regional Hospital where Grant and Palmer were pronounced dead. 

"The injuries are quite severe," said Senior Medical Officer Dr Tanya Hamilton-Johnson after a briefing with relatives. 

Commanding Officer for St Ann, Senior Superintendent of Police Dwight Powell says the 30-seater Coaster was travelling down a slope towards St James when the incident happened around 8:30 a.m., about 500m from the intersection with the Salem main road.

The Coaster bus driver may have just overtaken another vehicle when he lost control and the bus slammed into the 15-seater Hiace, which plies the Brown's Town to Ocho Rios route, the policeman said. 

Powell says the road was wet. 

He says the Coaster is owned by the Electoral Office of Jamaica. 

The incident caused a massive pile-up of traffic leading into Discovery Bay and Ocho Rios. 

Many of the motorists were on their way from the Reggae Sumfest music festival that finished early Sunday morning in Montego Bay, St James. 

In January, three persons were killed in a crash near the site of Sunday's incident. 

So far this year, 22 motor vehicle collisions have been recorded in St Ann, resulting in 27 deaths, Powell says 

In 2021, there were 17 collisions and 17 deaths, Powell said. 

- Carl Gilchrist 

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