SCHOOL BUS CRASH REPORTS 2006

School Bus Wreck Injures 16 Children
Two youngsters stay overnight in hospital.

June 29, 2006

Children were flung topsy-turvy from their seats when a First Student school bus ran off the right lane of Route N into a ditch yesterday afternoon.

Two of the 39 child passengers were taken to University Hospital with moderate injuries. Christopher Lindsay, 9, of Jefferson City and Gage Raithel, 9, of Centertown were listed in good condition today.

Fourteen of the children suffered minor injuries, as well as the bus driver, Ellen Daak, 40, of Jefferson City, said Trooper Matthew Halford of the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

The children, all about age 9, and six counselors - including some teens - were on their way to Rock Bridge Memorial State Park on a Jefferson City YMCA field trip. The bus exited northbound Highway 63 onto Highway 163 but continued westbound down Route N, missing the turn north at Pierpont, YMCA Executive Director Craig Lammers said. He did not have additional details about the wreck. The highway patrol has not issued any citations, but Halford said the crash is still under investigation.

Residents of the 9900 block of Route N weren’t home to witness the 1p.m. incident. Skid marks on the road and tire tread marks in the ditch indicate the bus veered to the right off the westbound lane, ran over a gravel driveway and came to a halt upright in a ditch.

"When the bus went over the hump of the driveway, it was rough and probably threw those kids around inside the bus," said Gale Blomenkamp, a division chief with the Boone County Fire Protection District.

The children likely bounced out of their seats, some hitting their heads on the roof, then crashed into the seats in front of them as the bus lurched to a halt.

"The children, being as light as they are, with the degree of the ditch and no seat belts," Halford said, "the kids were being thrown around."

Injuries included head and facial bruising and swelling, chest bruising and other bumps and cuts, Blomenkamp said.

Highway safety agencies won’t count the accident in school bus safety data, said a Missouri lawmaker in support of putting seat belts on buses.

"They won’t even look at it," Rep. Tim Flook, R-Liberty, said. 

"Nobody tracks injuries on buses. They only track fatalities, and they only track it if the bus is going to and from school."

Flook has been studying school bus safety since a bus wreck in Liberty claimed the lives of two motorists in May of 2004. The data he’s found so far makes him "nervous."

An average of four bus accidents occur in Missouri every day, although few result in injury.

Flook said the school bus industry "has fought every single safety measure for buses in the last 30 years," including higher-backed, padded seating used in school buses today.

This past legislative session, Flook sponsored a bill that would have imposed a surcharge on traffic tickets to help schools purchase bus safety belts.

The failed legislation also would have protected school districts and bus drivers from litigation if a child not wearing a seat belt suffered injuries.

Flook plans to push the bill to a vote in the coming session.

"We are paying for injuries right now with higher insurance premiums and people who don’t have insurance who are covered by the state," he said.

"We’re paying millions of dollars. Would we rather pay before or after the accident?

I’d rather pay before. It’s cheaper, and we don’t have children with mangled bodies or paralyzed."

Columbia Daily Tribune, MO

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