Police say 56 people have been injured, several critically, in a tour bus crash on the Coquihalla Highway, 30 kilometres south of Merritt, B.C.

RCMP say everyone on the bus sustained some kind of injury, ranging from cuts and scrapes to more serious injuries.

The tour bus was heading from the Okanagan to the Vancouver area when it hit a median and flipped over, RCMP say.

Ambulance reports it has sent 19 ground ambulances to the scene along with six helicopters.

The Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops and Kelowna General Hospital have both issued Code Orange alerts to bring in extra staff and resources as they prepares to receive patients.

Interior Health staff and physicians have mobilized to respond to a serious bus accident that has occurred on the Coquihalla Highway, south of Merritt.

Royal Inland Hospital (RIH) in Kamloops and Kelowna General Hospital (KGH) in Kelowna have initiated a Code Orange response in preparation of accepting patients from the crash. Additional staff members and physicians are being brought in to support critical areas such as the emergency department, lab, and diagnostics.

The incident occurred shortly before 3 p.m. Thursday.

According to Sgt. Norm Fleming with the Merritt RCMP, 56 people were on board the bus heading from the Okanagan to Vancouver.

“There were 35 that have suffered a minor level of injury, basically, ambulatory, non emergency…15 of them have what would be considered a more major injury, compound fractures and serious broken bones.

Six are being considered as a Code Red requiring an immediate air lift to a hospital for emergency services. Nobody is at this point a fatality.”