A train crashed into a bus at a rail crossing in southwest Argentina early Sunday, killing 26 people and injuring 60, local police said, according to Xinhua news agency.

The bus was carrying 61 passengers who were returning to Buenos Aires after spending the holiday at an Atlantic beach resort called Mar de Ajo. The train had 250 people aboard and was traveling from Buenos Aires to the holiday resort Mar de Plata.

The accident occurred at around 2:00 a.m. local time (0400 GMT) near the town of Dolores, some 200 km (130 miles) away from Buenos Aires.

Witnesses say that the bus driver drove through the crossing’s lowered safety barriers and ignored stop signs, although the train sounded its horn.

“It seems the driver of the bus passed when the barrier was down and the train cut the bus in half. ... It was inconceivably imprudent,” Daniel Scioli, the provincial governor, told local television at the crash scene, Reuters reports.

The bus’s two drivers were held in the custody of the police for questioning, to determine if they were responsible for the accident. Scioli promised a full investigation into the crash.

Among the victims there was a woman on a motorbike who had stopped at the crossing, waiting for the train to pass. The authorities reported that two children were killed in the crash.

Roberto Capiel, a health official in the town of Dolores, said some of the victims were “in a very serious condition.”

“There are injuries among the people who were traveling on the train, but the most serious are those who were on the bus,” one doctor said.

Televisions aired footage showing seats and passengers’ belongings spread all over the railway line as far as 200 feet from the point of impact.