This holds true whether you’re traveling to work on a city bus, heading to class on a school bus or taking a pleasure trip aboard a tour bus. Although the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration reports that annual bus passenger injuries and deaths have fallen in recent years, thousands of us keep dying or sustaining permanent injuries and disabilities on buses each year. We have to continue looking for new ways to protect ourselves from these tragedies.
Every time you step onto a bus, you place your life in someone else’s hands. This holds true whether you’re traveling to work on a city bus, heading to class on a school bus or taking a pleasure trip aboard a tour bus. Although the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration reports that annual bus passenger injuries and deaths have fallen in recent years, thousands of us keep dying or sustaining permanent injuries and disabilities on buses each year. We have to continue looking for new ways to protect ourselves from these tragedies.
This article first reviews some recent California bus accidents that highlight some of the most common human errors and mistakes involved in such incidents. It concludes with several safety tips that can help all of us avoid ever boarding some of the most questionable buses still out on the roads.
Recent California Bus Accidents
• On May 19, 2011, four buses and (at least) one car were involved in a Los Angeles accident. This chain reaction incident left eight people injured. It all apparently started after one car driver suddenly applied the brakes, causing four bus drivers and others behind the front car to panic and suddenly apply their own brakes;
• Just days later on May 23, 2011, a Vacaville bus accident took place when a bus ran off the freeway, plowed through a fence and then veered onto a new road and hit a car. At least 13 bus passengers were injured;
• A July 2010 Greyhound bus accident left the driver dead, along with five passengers. The driver was trying to avoid hitting an overturned SUV involved in another crash when he struck a concrete center divider and then hit another car;
• On October 25, 2010, a Los Angeles teenager ran a red light and slammed into a school bus with 46 children aboard. A 70-year-old pedestrian in a crosswalk was killed and 21 students were injured. Alcohol or illegal drug use was suspected in this case;
• At least five people died on April 28, 2009, when a tour bus carrying a Canadian guide and 34 French tourists was traveling through the Soledad, California area. The California Highway Patrol said the bus driver apparently lost control of the bus on an overpass just before the bus overturned.
Every traffic accident leaves us with many questions. However, since buses often carry a large number of passengers, traffic investigators work especially hard to quickly and efficiently determine which of the following factors may have caused a specific bus accident so that others can be prevented in the future:
• Driver error or fatigue;
• Illegal drug use or excessive alcohol consumption;
• Unfavorable weather conditions or lighting;
• Poorly marked freeways or roads; and
• Excessive speed
Fortunately, we can all take proactive steps to try and avoid riding on unsafe buses. The following suggestions should prove quite useful in that regard.
General Bus Passenger Safety Tips
• School bus safety records. Regardless of whether your child’s school district operates its own vehicles or contracts with a private company to drive its own buses, you can still contact the California Highway Patrol’s Commercial Vehicle Section to gain important safety information. For a fee, interested parties can request a Safety Compliance Report for the bus company (or school district) that drives the buses your child may soon be boarding. Past safety records should be available for at least several years;
• If you belong to a group planning to hire a tour bus company, be prepared to do a little research ahead of time so you can choose the safest company available. First, ask others for their recommendations for good tour bus companies, preferably based on firsthand experience with them. Next, visit www.safersys.org on the Internet to look up the available safety information on the companies you’re thinking about hiring. (You can either enter each company’s name or its Department of Transportation number.) Although there are fees involved, your group will probably want to cover these up front rather than take the chances of an accident occurring at a later date.
Don’t forget to review your group’s special needs, if any, so you can choose the right type of vehicle.
Before hiring any tour bus company, consider visiting its nearest terminal. Ask those present what they think of the service they’ve received from the company. Be sure to ask if the company is a member in good standing with one or more of the following: The California Bus Association, the United Motorcoach Association or the American Bus Association. Membership in one of these groups increases the chances that a company’s drivers are attending frequent safety seminars and are keeping up with the newest legislation that may govern their driving habits. (Note: If you’re looking up a company that only drives buses within the state of California, be aware that it should also have some type of record on file with the state Public Utility Commission.)
