More than 40 people were killed this morning in India, after their bus plunged into the Narmada river.

The incident happened in the western Indian state of Gujarat, in Vadodara, 55 miles southwest of Ahmedabad and most of the victims were children travelling to a school in Baroda.

According to BBC News, officials said that a school in Bodeli from the Baroda district had hired the bus to transport the children for an examination and that the tragedy happened after the driver stepped on the gas and lost control of the bus.

At this point the searches at the accident site continue as there are still more than 10 people missing. The water released into the canal through the Sardar Sarovar Dam was stopped in order to aid the rescue officers in their survivor search.

The State government has announced all the victims’ families of the tragedy and has requested a complete high level inquiry to determine the exact causes of the incident.

Accidents involving vehicles are very common in India, killing thousands of people every year. Most of them are blamed on imprudent driving and the badly maintained roads.

Over the past few years other incidents involving children were reported. Last December, 19 people died after a school bus collided with a train in the northern Indian state of Punjab, while driving over a railway crossing. In 2006, an accident similar to today’s event killed 6 children after their school bus ended up in a canal in the Haryana state.