1 Child Killed, 14 injured in Arlington School Bus Crash

[MountainLaurel]

One child was killed and more than a dozen were injured Monday morning when an Arlington County school bus collided with a trash truck at Courthouse Road and Columbia Pike about 8:40 a.m.

The bus was carrying students to Hoffman-Boston Elementary School in Arlington. Both the driver of the school bus and the driver of the trash truck were critically injured and were transported to area hospitals.

Chief Carol Sauliner of the Arlington fire department said that 14 other students were also injured. Two students were in critical condition. The other 12 Hoffman-Boston students were transported to Virginia Hospital Center with minor injuries.

Linda Erdos, spokeswoman for Arlington County Public Schools, said that the school system had notified all of the parents of children on bus--number 113, route 271. Counselors have been sent to Hoffman-Boston, which serves students in kindergarten through fifth grade.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62496-2005Apr18.html

[indepat]

1. The compelling reason why no child should ever be transported even

one extra mile to further some/any political/social agenda.

[DS1]

2. Children shouldn't be in those deathtraps period

[AP]

3. Does anyone know what the injury/fatality rate is school busses vs...

...walking/passenger cars?

[happyslug]

4. 58 vs 1100, school bus vs Pedestrian deaths

http://www.arthurhu.com/index/health/death.htm

Through the site does not seem to give an exact date (and seems a few years old). Also while School Buses deaths relate to deaths to, from and for school, Child Pedestrian deaths include ALL deaths for children including deaths NOT RELATED TO SCHOOL.

10 Kids killed per year ON A SCHOOL BUS, over 30 getting on or off a bus:
http://www.helpkeepkidssafe.org/pt_tips_sch.html

Causes of Children Pedestrian deaths:
http://www.wwgh.com/search/webpages/facts/pedestrian.htm

And finally "Mean Streets", reports from the Surface Transporation and Pedestrian Traffic:
http://www.transact.org/library/reports_html/ms2004/press_release.asp

[LizW]

5. It's higher in passenger cars overall

But deaths in buses get more attention because thereare sometimes multiple deaths in one accident.

Also, hearing about bus accidents is psychologically traumatic to parents. Every single time my kids get on a bus to go on a school trip, I worry. I don't worry every morning when I drive them to the school, even though statistically there's a greater likelihood of them getting in an accident with me than on the bus because they are in the car with me far more often.

[Ian David]

6. Thank God for tort reform. Damn trial lawyers

Otherwise, the parents of the dead and injured kids might get money.

[Roland99]

7. 5-point harnesses would be so horrible to implement

:eyes:

[theHandpuppet]

8. I don't understand why belts aren't MANDATORY

In an accident, most kids in a school bus are little more than flying projectiles. So many parents declare that they drive SUVs to keep their kids safe (which is B.S. anyway) but millions put their kids on school buses every day without so much as a seat belt.

[Roland99]

9. "They" (opponents) say seatbelts could fail or kids would panic

and be unable to unbuckle themselves in an accident or fire.

<sigh>

[DS1]

10. No, they don't want to spend 20 dollars per seat, per bus, per

city.

It's all about $$$$$, which is why those things are death traps, despite how well they are driven. The windows rarely work, and most kids can't squeeze out of them even if they did get through, and if the bus was still upright, the kid would likely fall right onto his/her head.

School buses are all pieces of shit, they should be turned to scrap, and replaced with better designed stuff instead of these aluminum cans with seats.