Kirk Hammett Still Haunted By Cliff Burton Tragedy

Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett speaks of how having to travel through Scandinavia in a bus this week opened up old wounds.

Metallica had to travel for 28 hours this week to get from Oslo to Riga in Latvia, due to the air crisis caused by volcano Eyjafjallajokull. It brought back painful memories for Hammett, who lost friend and bandmate Cliff Burton to a bus accident in Sweden on September 27th, 1986.

“When we boarded the bus again this week and had to travel overnight, I realized that those bad memories are still here. I still haven’t overcome the fear of buses. But the show must go on,” said Hammett.

“I just could not relax, thinking, ‘Wow, those buses have changed a lot since we traveled.’ They are so much more comfortable. You see, we did not use this means of transportation for more than two decades since the tragedy,” Hammett told reporters.