A school bus full of children headed to their first day of school for the academic year overturned after a crash with a minivan in Ohio, killing one child and injuring 23 others, authorities said.
Tyler Ross of the Ohio state highway patrol said there were 52 children from the north-western local schools district and a driver on the bus at the time of the crash shortly after 8am on Tuesday in the community of Lawrenceville.
The school bus – like many on roads across the US – had no seatbelts for the children, Ross told the news media.
Ross added that a minivan went into the oncoming traffic lane where the westbound bus was. The bus veered on to the shoulder but was unable to avoid contact with the minivan and overturned.
One student who was ejected from the bus was pronounced dead at the scene, he said.
Thirteen children were taken to hospitals by emergency medical responders and 10 others were brought to hospitals by family members or other personal means. Of the 23 total injuries among those on the bus, 22 were described as not life-threatening. One child was seriously injured and was taken to the children’s hospital.
The minivan driver and a passenger were taken to a hospital with injuries that were not considered life-threatening.
The north-western district said classes at its campuses were to begin on Tuesday morning. A parent reunification center was set up at a firehouse near the scene of the wreck.
School bus crashes are relatively rare. One study found there are about 63,000 crashes involving buses of all kinds across the US annually. And the organization School Bus Fleet estimates nearly 490,000 yellow school buses provide transportation daily in the US, making them a safer option for children than walking or getting a regular car ride, according to the National Safety Council.
Nonetheless, after a 2020 school bus crash killed two people, including a seven-year-old child, the National Transportation Safety Board called for all school buses to be equipped with lap and shoulder seatbelts.
Federal law requires three-point seat belts on small school buses, but it’s up to individual jurisdictions to decide whether to require them for larger school buses.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
