Buttskop crossing shutdown proposed

SIXTEEN years after 13-year-old Jody Phillips was killed at the Buttskop railway crossing in Blackheath, the City of Cape Town says the crossing could finally be removed.

- MURRAY SWART

THE Buttskop railway crossing where 10 children died in 2010 has been earmarked for closure under the City's proposed Zevenwacht Link Road project. | Independent Newspapers Archive

(Independent Newspapers Archive)

On August 25, 2010, Jody left home for school like any other morning. He never came back.

The scholar transport taxi carrying him and other pupils overtook vehicles waiting at the closed boom at the level crossing and was struck by an oncoming train. The driver survived.

Ten children died that day: Liesl Augis, 11; Jody Phillips, 13; Reece Smith, 7; Nolan February, 13; Michaelin de Koker, 11; Jason Pedro, 14; Nadine Marthinissen, 16; Jean-Pierre Willeman, 13; Cody Erasmus, 15; and Jade Adams, 10.

The driver, Jacob Humphreys, was convicted in 2011 of 10 counts of murder and four of attempted murder and sentenced to 20 years in prison. The Supreme Court of Appeal later reduced his sentence to eight years and replaced the murder convictions with culpable homicide. He was granted parole in 2018.