5 elementary students transported to hospital after bus is rear-ended in Ypsilanti
- Related article: Saline school bus involved in collision Tuesday morning
Five elementary students were transported to the hospital Tuesday with non-life-threatening injuries, after their bus was rear-ended on the way home from school, county officials said.
Students board an Ypsilanti school bus in this file photo. An accident in Ypsilanti Tuesday afternoon involving a WISD school bus sent five students to the hospital.
Mark Bialek | For AnnArbor.com
Jackson said the total number of students on the bus at the time is still unknown, as county transportation officials still are preparing their report. Jackson said another bus was sent to pick up the students from the scene. It is not known how much of a delay the students experienced in getting home.
Police did respond to the crash, Jackson said. AnnArbor.com could not reach the Ypsilanti Police Department for comment.
Jackson said the bus had minor damage, a slight dent and some scrapping to the bumper.
Huron Valley Ambulance spokeswoman Joyce Williams said the call came in at 3:57 p.m. The second vehicle involved was a Ford Ranger truck. All students who were transported to the hospital were in stable condition.
This story will be updated as information becomes available.
Danielle Arndt covers K-12 education for AnnArbor.com. Follow her on Twitter @DanielleArndt or email her at daniellearndt@annarbor.com.
Comments
snapshot
Thu, Jan 24, 2013 : 5:40 a.m.
You have to be a real incompetent to rear end a school bus. It's huge, it's bright yellow, and it contains children. I don't care what the school bus does or doesn't do, drivers should be aware and able to react accordingly without colliding with a school bus.
SuperiorMother
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 2:45 p.m.
To those who are concerned about the lack of seatbelts on school buses: School buses use a passive restraint/protection system known as "compartmentalization" - think of how an egg carton keeps your eggs from breaking. Here is an article that does a nice job explaining the issue: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40820669/ns/us_news-life/t/why-your-childs-school-bus-has-no-seat-belts/#.UP_3BB072Ag
Nicholas Urfe
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 2:33 p.m.
Strap the kids in with multi-point harnesses, and helmets. We must think of their safety!
jns131
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 6:35 p.m.
We only do that, except for the helmets, on preschool buses. Thanks for the giggles though.
FrankOZ
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 2:05 p.m.
Ummmm, I know that typically when a vehicle has been rear-ended it is the rear-enders fault, but why are we assuming it is their fault without all the facts. I drive from Ann Arbor into Ypsi every morning for work and I see school bus drivers do things that make me cringe.......every single morning! This goes for Ann Arbor and Ypsi. No turn signals, cutting off traffic, running red lights....... I'm am not saying all the drivers are bad, but some of the things I see make me wonder. Could be an abrupt stop made this happen? Let's hold judgement until all the facts have been presented.
TryingToBeObjective
Fri, Jun 7, 2013 : 4:30 p.m.
I'm with ya. Some of the bus drivers in AA speed and take corners too quickly. My kid was injured years back. Never put my kid on a bus again. AAPS transportation is a joke- they protect their own incompetents. To this day, the AAPS busses speed through my neighborhood. They are putting kids at risk, but I guess it's always someone else's fault, and someone else's problem.
Linda Peck
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 1:27 p.m.
I just get so angry when I read this. Children are not bucked into their seats. Travesty number one! Two, people are in such a rush to go somewhere, they cannot even keep themselves from running into a school bus. My prayers go out to all of the children on that bus, any school bus, and for those who are hurt, both physically and emotionally. It is terrifying to have one's body thrown about!
jns131
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 6:34 p.m.
Tis better to be in a bus then not to be in a bus at all. Buses have been proven to be safer then an SUV any day of the week.
YpsiGirl4Ever
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 7:03 a.m.
Hope all the students, bus driver and even the auto vehicle driver who caused this accident, will be okay!
In doubt
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 12:28 a.m.
The seats are designed to protect the students with the padding. If they are sitting in their seats facing forward like they should be and thrown forward the padding will absorb the impact. Seat belts would be hard to maintain, getting wet on the floor mostly and would cause rust issues. In case of an emergency situation where the driver had to evacuate the bus there may be only minutes and no time to have cut the belts. Parents can help by talking to their children about sitting down and facing forward on the bus to help enforce the safety rules.
In doubt
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 12:37 p.m.
The seats have a tendency to get wet too. Little snow covered boots on the seat, wet backpacks, spills, and windows left down and it starts pouring rain, ect. In an evacuation, time is of the essence. There have been many times the drivers have barely gotten the students off the bus, to add the possibility of taking more time is just an unsafe option.
Silly Sally
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 11:50 a.m.
It is so, so easy to add something so that the belts do not slip between the seats to the floor. Most 4-year olds proudly show how they can undo their belts. Was this a BUS, or a smaller van? I find it hard to believe that a BIG 50 passenger bus could be moved enough by a pickup truck to injure kids if they were in their seats, facing forward, and the seats had high seat-backs to prevent whip-lash. This seems like a small 10 pasenger van, and the pickure is a stock photo and imight be misleading.
Ann English
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : midnight
I'm thinking that it must have been a vehicle taller than a passenger car that hit the bus. I would expect that if a sedan hit the bus, all the damage would be on the sedan. We know how passenger cars end up trapped underneath semi-trailers if they rear-end that kind of truck.
annarboral
Tue, Jan 22, 2013 : 11:38 p.m.
Why aren't seat belts required on school buses? I would get a ticket for not using one but schools get a free pass for not protecting our children. Even if they were not legally required I would insist that they be installed and used! What is our school board doing about this critical issue of child safety? Oh yeah they are looking for highly paid consultants to study the problem.
Silly Sally
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 11:44 a.m.
Have you ever heard of new busses? Add them for those? Busses do get replaced. We did that for cars, and there are not too many pre 1965 cars left on th road today.
Robert Granville
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 12:49 a.m.
Did you consult google? If not, why not? I wondered the answer to that very question once... I know now. It's because they're the safest vehicle on the road, seatbelts aren't especially useful in bus crashes and they are cost prohibitive to add now that the vast majority of full length buses don't have them.
GoNavy
Tue, Jan 22, 2013 : 11:50 p.m.
We should require cars to stay 25 feet behind buses. That way, we could prevent collisions. Just like a law requiring seat belt usage has completely eliminated deaths of individuals not wearing seatbelts. Just create a law, and the problem will disappear.
jns131
Tue, Jan 22, 2013 : 11:34 p.m.
Another reason to slow down folks. It is accidents like these that could have made this life threatening. Glad to hear it was nothing more then bumps bruises and a few scares.
Billy
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 1:11 p.m.
Once again...accident BLAMED on speeding....when it was much more likely the cause was ineptitude or inattention... It has been proven time and time again the only thing SPEED ever does is increase the damage/injuries in accidents.....it does NOT increase the propensity for an accident. As you drive faster the chance of a accident goes down EXPONENTIALLY. This is from all the SAME NHTSB statistics that people love to toss around all the time.
RCDC
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 3:30 a.m.
@peggy they dont have seatbelts because its proven that seatbelts are more dangerous on buses!
Peggy
Wed, Jan 23, 2013 : 12:05 a.m.
@GoNavy, staying in their seats is not going to protect the children when the bus is hit. The only thing that will help them is a properly buckled seat belt. Never could understand why buses don't have seat belts, very dangerous.
GoNavy
Tue, Jan 22, 2013 : 11:49 p.m.
More like another reason to stay in your seats, as the bus driver informed us all since we were little.