School bus crash kills 5 innocent children in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The fatalities included four girls and one boy – one kindergartener, one first grader and three fourth graders. A school bus crash is not the headline we wanted to see this morning – especially just a few days away from the holidays.
CHATTANOOGA, TN (WRCB) –
The school bus crash arrest report for school bus driver Johnthony Walker says that the school bus was “traveling at a high rate of speed” according to witness statements and physical evidence gathered by Chattanooga police. The bus has 35 students aboard. Walker was driving “well above” the posted speed of 30 mph, police say, when the bus rolled over Monday afternoon and crashed into a tree, injuring 26 students and claiming the lives of five children. Police say Walker lost control of the bus and swerved off the right side of the roadway, striking and elevated driveway and a mailbox. He then swerved to the left and the bus began to overturn, striking a utility pole and a tree. Walker, 24, was arrested on five counts of vehicular homicide, reckless endangerment and reckless driving. Bond for Walker was set at $107,500.
School bus crashes and it has been said that school buses are the safest way to transport your children to and from school. The color and size of school buses make them easily visible and identifiable, their height provides good driver visibility and raises the bus passenger compartment above car impact height; and emergency vehicles are the only other vehicle on the road that can stop traffic like a school bus can. School buses are carefully designed on a different transportation and protection model than the average passenger car. The children are protected like eggs in an egg carton – compartmentalized, and surrounded with padding and structural integrity to secure the entire container. The seat backs are raised and the shell is reinforced for protection against impact.
Then how does this happen? Where are the seatbelts that are mandatory for passenger vehicles? U.S. regulations only require seatbelts on small school buses – those under 10,000 pounds. And only six states require all school buses to be equipped with seatbelts (Texas, California, Florida, Louisiana, New Jersey and New York).
Well I would not want to be the person to tell the parents and relatives of these 5 children that school buses are safe and seatbelts were not needed.
Our prayers are with those families and their loss. Despite this tragic news, we at Ron Kim Law do hope that everyone has a safe holiday weekend. For more information regarding this horriffic accident go to: http://hollywoodlife.com/2016/11/21/chattanooga-school-bus-crash-children-dead-tennessee-accident/
