‘I don’t know why this happened’
Truck company ordered to cease operations pending investigation
CALGARY — The driver of the semi truck that collided with the bus carrying the Humboldt Broncos hockey team is a “good guy” who had been driving with the Calgary-based company for only a month before Friday’s catastrophic crash, says the trucking company’s owner.
Sukhmander Singh told Postmedia News Tuesday his remaining truck has been taken off the road while police investigate the crash that killed 15 people, injured 14 others and all but obliterated the front of the Broncos bus.
“He’s a good guy,” Singh said of his employee who was driving when the crash occurred around 5 p.m. Friday at a highway intersection in northeastern Saskatchewan. The force of the crash propelled both vehicles into the ditch. The bus ended up on its side, its roof peeled back and its front end destroyed. The trailer of the truck lay nearby in a shattered mess, its cargo of peat moss scattered across the roadway.
Singh, who owns Adesh Deol Trucking Ltd., said his driver had been behind the wheel at his company “for about a month.”
“I don’t know what’s wrong over there, why this went wrong for this guy,” he said Tuesday.
“I don’t know why this happened,” Singh said, offering his sympathies to the families of the victims.
“They don’t sit alone. I have kids too.”
Alberta Transportation Minister Brian Mason confirmed Tuesday the company has been ordered to cease operations pending an investigation.
In the meantime, the company’s licence to operate has been suspended while investigators examine drivers’ logs, among other records.
Mason said the company began operation in the fall, has no violations on record and appears to have been compliant “up until this point.”
Singh declined to identify the male driver, who wasn’t injured in the crash and who was taken into custody after the collision, but released a short time later. Singh said the man is the only other driver he employs.
In an open letter to the driver shared online more than 139,000 times, an Ottawa woman says she hopes he will “be able to heal.
“As we all sit back and contemplate everything that has occurred since the collision and start to process the massive emotional impact of the death of 15 people, I want you to know you are in our minds too,” the letter reads. “Please know that some of us are thinking of you as well.”
The bus was carrying 29 people when it collided with the transport trailer at a rural intersection.
Singh said it has been a few days since he last spoke to his driver and had no updates on his condition, but said he did seek counselling.
Like many other people connected to the crash, Singh said he didn’t immediately know who had survived, fearing his driver dead. When he learned the man was alive, Singh said he drove to Saskatoon to pick him up and take him home to Calgary.
Collision experts have said it could be months before investigators determine what caused the crash.
“Two objects come together and they depart at different angles and you’re looking for any indication of braking, skid marks, gouge marks on the roadway, that kind of thing,” said retired RCMP collision analyst Rob Creasser.
The semi truck would have had to yield to a stop sign before crossing over the highway the bus was travelling on. A stand of trees on the southeast corner of the intersection limits visibility of the approach
on both roads.
As crash questions linger, it was the start of a “new normal” Tuesday as students began returning to school in Humboldt.
“These were our kids,” said Kevin Garinger, Horizon School Division director of education and also president of the Broncos, as he fought back tears Tuesday.
“In them, our students see shining
examples of the young adults and athletes they’re dreaming of growing up to be.”
Younger students in Humboldt may have been reading partners with members of the Broncos. Others at Humboldt Collegiate Institute were classmates and friends. Five members of this year’s Broncos squad were students at the high school and three others were former
students.
About 50 crisis responders were on hand and nearly 100 staff from schools and school divisions around the province have travelled to Humboldt to help.
“Each family deals with these things in a different way. Each child will react to things differently,” said Saskatoon Greater Catholic Schools Division director of education Greg Chatlain.
“What they feel they need … needs to be guided by them.”
“Getting back to normal, a new normal,” said Garinger, “is something very critical for our children, our families and all of us.”
Funerals will be held Friday for Adam Herold and Monday for Evan Thomas. At 16, Herold, of Montmartre, Sask., was the youngest and newest member of the Broncos. He would have turned 17 on Thursday.
Thomas, who was 18 and from Saskatoon, was a forward in his first season with the team.