Thursday, October 25, 2007

Another school bus crash hits close to home

Seems there has been a rash of school bus crashes. One in Calgary not too long ago resulted in the death of a 9 year girl. Charges are pending against the driver.

Earlier this week, a school bus rear ended a truck stopped to turn left not too far from our town. There was considerable damage and both drivers were sent to hospital for treatment. Seems the high school kids on the bus did exactly what they should have...punched open the back back and evacuated to the shoulder.

This morning, I got a call from our DD, saying our 5 year old grandson's school bus was rear ended by a car in a multiple vehicle crash. All the kids are Okay and are now in class. The bus company did the call out to all the parents, so they got the information first hand from the source and didn't hear it via the media.

All this gets me thinking. It wasn't too long ago that all the school bus companies were pleading with the public to come out and drive for them. Their big perk was you could take along up to 2 pre-school children so Moms could work and not have to get daycare. I wondered if they rushed into putting unqualified drivers behind the wheel - transporting our very precious cargo.

I know when my children rode the school bus for the very first time, I was apprehensive and followed them behind until they got to school safe and sound. The girls were quite happy when I was satisfied they would be safe and just waved goodbye at the front door. Maybe the fact that they were 13 and 11 years old was the most embarrassing part of it. But once a Mother, always a Mother!

1 comment:

Pumpkin said...

Wow. Is that what they do out there? You would think, that considering the buses do not have seat belts that they would want well trained drivers. Having a vehicle run into the bus unfortunately cannot be controlled :o( I'm glad to hear your grandson is okay :o)