Fourteen people have been confirmed dead following a horrific crash of a tour bus in The Bronx, New York, over the weekend. The tour bus was returning from a night out for its passengers at the Mohegan Sun Casino in eastern Connecticut. The 40-year old bus driver survived the crash and had told investigators that a passing tractor-trailer had clipped the bus thereby causing him to lose control of the vehicle before overturning and skidding almost 500-feet into a highway sign whose support structure then sliced through the bus.
While the investigation is still ongoing, there are some who are not quite as certain of the bus driver’s accounts; Investigators have been hearing witness and survivor accounts of the bus having driving across the rumble strips multiple times before the bus overturned. Rumble strips are placed along the shoulders of many highways in order to alert drivers whenever they are leaving the travelled portion of the roadway and are heading for the edge of the pavement. This system is put into place in large part to “wakeup” drivers who may be beginning to nod off.
There were 32 people on board the bus when it crashed – The 14 who perished, 17 survivors, and the driver. Of the 17 passengers who survived the crash, there were five who were critically injured, two suffered serious injuries, and eleven who suffered only minor injuries.
The driver of the tractor-trailer that the bus driver reported as clipping the bus has notified authorities and both he and his company have been giving the investigators their full cooperation. The state police have possession of both the trailer and the tractor that was pulling it at the time of the incident and are treating the investigation as criminal in nature and that it is still in its infant stages.
Eyewitnesses that the Lawyer has spoken with that saw the accident as it unfolded have expressed their absolute shock and many expressed that although the accident happened very quickly, it all seemed like it was in slow motion.
If you are ever involved in an accident and do not know whether you should accept an insurance company’s offer to settle out of court, you should consult with a New York Truck Accident Attorney first. A New York Truck Accident Attorney has your best interests in mind and will protect those interests when others may attempt to use your injuries for their own gain.