Clues sought in deadly bus crash

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. — A maintenance crew had slowed traffic on a California highway through the night, and the work had gone on for hours without problems. Then a tour bus returning to Los Angeles from a casino trip slammed into the back of a semi-truck. Passengers who were asleep on the bus woke to the sounds of crushing metal and screams.

The gambling jaunt ended in one of the deadliest wrecks in California history with 13 people killed and 31 others injured.

Authorities said the truck was traveling at 5 mph when the bus, moving as fast as 65 mph, plowed into it on Interstate 10 just north of the desert resort town of Palm Springs. The crash crushed the front 15 feet of the bus.

It was not known whether alcohol, drugs or fatigue played a role in the crash, but the bus was inspected in April and had no mechanical issues, California Highway Patrol Border Division Chief Jim Abele said. The bus driver was killed, and the truck driver received minor injuries.

The National Transportation Safety Board was investigating.

The bus was coming from Red Earth Casino in the desert town of Thermal and was about 35 miles into its 135-mile trip back to Los Angeles. California Highway Patrol officers had been slowing traffic to allow utility workers to string wires across the freeway, Abele said.

Passengers said most people were asleep when the crash occurred shortly after 5 a.m. Abele said it appeared the 1996 bus didn’t have seat belts and likely didn’t have a data recorder outfitted in newer vehicles.

Ana Car, 61, said she never felt the crash but awoke to the horror of screaming and crying. Most passengers had been flung to the front of the bus and those who could move were pushing and shoving in the dark to climb out from under each other.

The retired factory worker started screaming and clambered to a broken window to yell for help, panicked that she would be trapped if the bus caught fire. Motorists who stopped to help pulled her out the broken window.

“I couldn’t stand when they got me out,” Car said. “I sat on the side of the road, watching them pull so many people out. I saw so much blood and two dead bodies. I was so scared.”

Before April, the bus was inspected in 2014 and 2015, the California Highway Patrol said. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration records show it had no crashes in the past two years and had a satisfactory safety rating.

Fourteen people were sent to Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs, the area’s only trauma center. Of the eight who were still known to be hospitalized, four remained in critical condition Monday, hospital officials said.

Information for this article was contributed by Julie Watson, Courtney Bonnell, Daisy Nguyen and John Antczak of The Associated Press.