3 days ago
12 injured in school bus rollover in Texas county reeling from flooding
Aug. 13 (UPI) -- Twelve people, nearly all children, were hospitalized Wednesday after their school bus rolled over in Travis County, a region still reeling from flooding one month ago.
Authorities said during a press conference that the bus was transporting 42 children and one adult, presumably the driver, of the Leander Independent School District, primarily from Bagdad Elementary School, about 26 miles north of Austin.
Sgt. Billy Ray, public information officer for the Texas Department of Public Safety, Highway Patrol Division, told reporters that they received calls about the rollover at about 3:15 p.m. CDT.
The preliminary investigation shows that the bus was traveling south down 22100 Nameless Road, when "for an unknown reason," the vehicle left the right side of the roadway, causing it to roll over, he said.
Of the 12 people hospitalized, one appeared to be the driver, whose condition was unknown. Among the remaining injured, one person suffered life-threatening injuries while two others suffered potentially life-threatening injuries, authorities said.
Eight EMS ambulance units and two helicopters were deployed to the scene, transporting the injured to Dell Children's Medical Center, Texas Children's Hospital North Austin Campus or Dell Children's -- Cedar Park.
Authorities said the dispatch of the helicopters does not reflect the severity of the injuries suffered, but rather the distance the ambulances had to travel to the crash site in rural Travis County.
Ray identified the bus as a 2024 Blue Bird that was equipped with seatbelts.
Bruce Gearing, LISD superintendent, explained that students are required to wear seatbelts when the bus is equipped with them.
He said this incident compounds the pain Travis County is already feeling from last month's flooding, which destroyed nearly 200 homes and killed at least 10 people.
"This part of our Leander ISD family has been through so much already this summer with the floods, and this tragedy this afternoon has really breaking our hearts," he said.
"We want each of those students and their families to know that our prayers are with them, our thoughts are with them and we will do everything that we can in our power to support them. We will be here for all of those students who were affected and their friends and families as much as we can."
A reunification center was established at Round Mountain Baptist Church where all other students on the bus who did not require hospital transport were taken.
Asked about the driver, Gearing described him as "one of our seasoned bus drivers."
It was the second school bus to suffer a traffic incident in Texas on Wednesday, and the third in a week.
On Wednesday morning, a bus from the Cleveland Independent School District "was involved in an accident and came to a rest on its side," the district said in a statement.
All students were safely removed from the bus and provided medical attention, it said, adding that they were taken to a local hospital "out of an abundance of caution."
And a few days earlier, a bus transporting Cleveland High School and Cleveland Ninth Grade Center students was involved in a crash and "came to rest on its side in a ditch," the CISD said in a statement.
All students were evacuated and received immediate medical attention, with some transported to local hospitals for evaluation of minor injuries, it added.
