Adelaide Metro bus driver and passenger hospitalized after crash into rail bridge pylon

Emergency crews have worked for more than an hour to free a bus driver who became trapped after the Adelaide Metro passenger service struck a concrete rail bridge support pylon at Port Adelaide.

The crash occurred shortly before 9am on Commercial Road, near Baynes Place.

The driver, a 37-year-old Kensington Park man, was taken to hospital in a serious but stable condition, while a 28-year-old female passenger was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Three other passengers were treated at the scene, SA Police said.

Clinton Daniels, from the SA Ambulance Service Special Operation Team, said the driver required "extensive treatment" at the scene, including blood transfusions, before he was taken to the Royal Adelaide Hospital.

"Both have significant injuries from the impact of the bus and the crumpling of the bus onto the patient themselves," he said.

"The driver was extensively trapped through being compressed through his lower limbs."

He praised the efforts of the Metropolitan Fire Service (MFS) firefighters and the "technically difficult job" they undertook to free the driver and passenger.

MFS commander Simon Kirkmoe said the driver and passenger had been trapped on board by their lower limbs, while about four other passengers were able to get off the bus unassisted.

He said the MFS worked for about half an hour to remove the passenger from the bus, while the driver took "over an hour" to free.

“The driver presented more of a complex removal," Mr Kirkmoe said.

"We had to use some techniques to drag the bus backwards off the pylon to then use some hand tools and hydraulic tools to actually remove the steering column in the front off the bus off of those lower limbs to enable them to be removed."

He said 19 firefighters were involved in the rescue, including a specialist technical rescue team.

“There is a lot of damage to the front of the bus and it would be one of the more significant accidents we’ve been to with busses in recent times," Mr Kirkmoe said.

In a statement, a Department for Infrastructure and Transport spokesperson said train services between Alberton and Outer Harbor were temporarily suspended and replaced with substitute buses, pending a safety inspection which had now been completed.

The train service has since resumed.

SA Police said investigations into the crash were continuing, while road closures around the scene would remain in place until the scene was cleared.