Church bus crash kills 13
Collides head-on with truck on highway in Texas
UVALDE, Texas — A small shuttle bus carrying Texas church members home from a retreat collided head-on with a pickup truck, killing 13 people and injuring two others Wednesday on a two-lane highway in southwestern Texas, officials said.
All of the victims who died were senior adults who attended First Baptist Church of New Braunfels, Texas, including the driver. A total of 14 seniors were on the bus and the driver was the only person in the pickup when the vehicles collided about 12:30 p.m. local time on U.S. 83 outside Garner State Park in northern Uvalde County, according to Texas Department of Public Safety Sgt. Conrad Hein and a church statement. The area is about 120 kilometres west of San Antonio.
Hein said two bus passengers and the pickup driver were injured and hospitalized. One of those passengers died at a San Antonio hospital late Wednesday, Texas Department of Public Safety Lt. Johnny Hernandez said.
The lone surviving passenger was hospitalized in critical condition, while the truck driver was hospitalized in stable condition, he said.
It was not immediately clear what caused the collision almost 200 km from the church, where the members were headed.
The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board has sent investigators to the scene, spokesman Terry Williams said.
Photos and video of the crash’s aftermath showed heavy damage to the front drivers’ sides of both vehicles, where it appeared the two had collided. The back of the bus was up on a guardrail, with glass and debris scattered onto the grass below.
Hein said the small bus was a 2004 Turtle Top, though he did not know the specific model. Turtle Top’s website features shuttle buses with capacities ranging from 17 to 51 passengers, which they bill as “a great alternative to the standard 15-passenger van.”
Safety concerns have long surrounded the 15-passenger vans, also frequently used by churches and other groups, with advocates saying they can be difficult to control in an emergency.
Church officials said on the First Baptist website that the members were returning from a three-day retreat at the Alto Frio Baptist Encampment in Leakey, about 15 km north of the crash site.
The church officials were “ministering to family members to help them deal with this tragedy,” according to a statement on the website. Counsellors also were scheduled to be available today at the church.