Texas School Bus Accident
An 18-wheeler truck side-swiped a Mount Pleasant, Texas school bus carrying the high school track team injuring 18 students and three coaches at 10:30PM on March 23rd. The truck which had swerved into oncoming traffic then struck a car traveling behind the bus and killed the coach of the girl’s track team.
Here at our firm, Todd Tracy repeatedly questioned why we buckle up our most precious cargo when we get into the family car, but we don’t require school buses to be equipped with seat belts.
The answer is that school bus manufacturers as well as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) which is an industry lap dog continue to perpetuate a myth about the safety of school buses.
My law firm’s Crash Lab has found in case after case that school buses do not adequately protect passengers from severe injuries or death in a school bus crash. School buses fail to utilize affordable safety systems such as three-point-seat belts and window glass that prevents a child from being ejected in a rollover accident. We should expect the same protection inside a school bus that we are accustomed to in the family car.
The school bus crash which occurred in Titus County, Texas as the students and coaches were returning home from a track meet in Paris, Texas resulted in a rollover accident. School bus rollover accidents are more common than school administrators are willing to believe.
A school bus accident in Chattanooga, Tennessee that caused death and traumatic injuries to elementary students on November 21, 2016 is a case in point. The awful scene that first responders found inside the bus at the time of the accident likely resembled this actual crash footage of another rollover school bus crash. This graphically illustrates the need for safer systems on the nation’s school buses.
So what can you as a parent do? Download my investigative report, “School Bus Safety in America”. Share it with fellow parents online and insist that school board members, principals, coaches and teachers read it.
If your child is a student athlete, a band member or part of a school group that rides a school bus to events outside your home city, then they are at a higher risk. I am the parent of two high school athletes and I absolutely will not allow them to ride a school bus because of the unsafe problems my team of automotive engineers have uncovered in our lawsuits against bus manufacturers.
Please feel free to contact me with your questions or if you need legal representation for a school bus accident, call Todd Tracy 214-324-9000.
