South Africa bus crash: driver to be sentenced

A bus driver who caused the deaths of 27 Britons in a South African coach crash is appearing in court for sentencing.

Titus Dube, 42, is appearing at a magistrates court in Lydenburg, near the scene of the tragedy.

The father-of-five pleaded guilty to culpable homicide last month.

He could face up to 10 years in jail but court sources say he may only get community service.

The coach was carrying a party of holidaymakers when it careered off Long Tom Pass, a perilous mountain road, in September 1999.

Its roof was ripped off and it flipped over twice, flinging people up to 200ft from the wreckage and leaving some bodies hanging in trees.

The tourists had been visiting game parks near the Kruger National Park and were travelling through the Drakensburg mountains in the Mpumalanga province.

Twenty-six died instantly along with a South Africa tour guide and another tourist died weeks later in hospital.

But the husband of a Thomas Cook tour guide left brain damaged by the crash pleaded for Dube not to be jailed.

Tony Sandover, from Oxted, Surrey, whose wife Carole is still in a coma, said: "I would far rather he gets 10,000 hours of community service teaching children not to drive dangerously."