Prosecutors in Veliko Tarnovo are investigating the crash that killed two truck drivers and destroyed two lorries and a bus near Maslarevo on the Ruse–Sofia road early on 28 October. The latest official briefing identifies the dead as a 38-year-old Bulgarian citizen and a Hungarian driver.
The collision occurred at about 02:32. The preliminary account is that one lorry crossed into the opposite lane and hit an oncoming truck head-on. Both vehicles caught fire. A Bulgarian-registered bus then made contact with the burning vehicles despite its driver braking, and also caught fire.
The bus was travelling from Bucharest to Thessaloniki with 36 Erasmus students, 32 of them foreign nationals. Passengers escaped after windows were broken. No one among them was seriously injured, according to the prosecutor’s statement. They were accommodated at a crisis centre in Polski Trambesh, with onward transport towards Sofia being arranged.
The investigation concerns causing the deaths of more than one person through a breach of road-traffic rules. Inspections and witness interviews were continuing. Planned examinations include vehicle and fire analysis, forensic medical work and DNA testing to establish the identities of the drivers whose bodies were burned.
A European Investigation Order is also to be used to obtain information because a foreign national was involved. The preliminary description of a lane incursion is not a final determination of fault, and the prosecution announcement does not announce a conviction or settle all the circumstances.
Early reports referred to a Romanian-registered lorry. This update replaces that account with the later official identification of a Hungarian driver; nationality and vehicle registration are not interchangeable. It also distinguishes the 36 passengers from the 38 people initially reported aboard, including the two drivers.
No confirmed road-reopening time was established in the sources checked for this update. Open questions include the precise sequence of impacts, the vehicles’ technical condition and the fire’s causes. Answers will depend on the evidence and expert examinations.
Updated on 28 October 2026 from the prosecutor’s official briefing published at 15:55 EET. Driver information and the passenger count have been clarified.
