NATIONAL COALITION OF SCHOOL BUS SAFETY NEWS 2007

School Board Failed to Call Parents and Police After School Bus Accident
February 10, 2007

YARMOUTH — An investigation is underway after a bus carrying 13 elementary students from Meadowfields Community School in Yarmouth slid off a slippery road.

Driver Roy Goudey passed the children through an emergency exit to an older student standing in a snowy ditch where the bus landed.

The road was covered in about 20 centimetres of heavy slush, said Mr. Goudey.

"We were real lucky," he said.

Police or ambulances were not called and parents were not notified of the accident, which happened Monday.

Other buses took the students home.

"We’re not taking this lightly," said Joe Hazleton, a spokesman for the Tri-County regional school board.

"Parents should have been called, RCMP should have been sent out and the children should have been checked out but that didn’t occur."

Schools superintendent Phil Landry told a local radio station Friday that board policy is to call for emergency services if injuries are suspected and to notify parents.

"We didn’t do that and we’re at fault," he said.

The bus was dropping students off at their homes in the Overton area on the outskirts of Yarmouth sometime after 2:30 p.m. It rounded a turn but did not stay in its own lane, sliding instead across the centre line and going off the road.

"The bus . . . slid down over the shoulder and came to rest at about, I’d say, a 35- to 40-degree angle," said Mr. Hazleton.

"At some point afterward the bus then came over and came to rest on the driver’s side on the ground.

"Children were pushed around a little bit, from what I understand."

Mr. Goudey said he stayed in the bus and "passed (the students) out through to my biggest girl.

"She held the door and took the kids out through for me as I passed them out.

"I had about seven real small ones and the rest of them were older."

Mr. Hazleton said "we’re not aware of any serious injuries that did occur but since the bus did tip there may have been bruising, scratching, things like that."

He said the next school board meeting is Feb. 20 but he didn’t know if a special meeting would be called sooner to deal with the issue.

By BRIAN MEDEL Yarmouth Bureau

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