[CP Photo by Jessica Crombie]
A Caroline County school bus carrying more than 40 middle and high school students overturned Friday afternoon, Oct. 30 near Caroline High School after colliding with a van driven by a 17-year-old CHS student. Five of the passengers suffered serious, but not life-threatening injuries, and 23 had minor injuries. They were transported to various area hospitals, along with the drivers of the bus and van.
Interviewed Friday at the scene, Caroline County Sheriff Tony Lippa told the CP, “At about three minutes before 3 p.m. we received a call that involved a traffic crash at the intersection of Golansville Road and Rogers Clark Boulevard. It appears a white van driven by a juvenile was coming out of the school parking lot and she thought she had enough time to get across the road. Unfortunately she misjudged that and collided with the school bus, which caused the bus to overturn.”
The bus landed upside down on the median. According to witnesses, CHS students and parents ran over to help free the passengers trapped inside.
“The total police presence included 17 from the sheriffs office,” Lippa said. “Day shift, evening shift, investigators, administrators—when we get a call like this, we all respond. The state police sergeant and five other troopers have been helping us with traffic control, and with getting names and information of all involved.
“It has been a great effort between the state police, sheriff’s office and fire and rescue,” Lippa said. “We received outside help from Hanover County, from A.P. Hill, one from LifeCare and two from Spottsylvania, so we had about 27 fire and rescue personnel helping us.”
As reconstruction of the accident continued under the direction of CCSO Deputy Sam Smith, traffic was detoured around the scene for several hours. Asked whether charges might be pending, Lippa said that would depend upon further investigation of the collision.
“We’ve been truly blessed and fortunate that, with so many injuries, everything went very smoothly,” Lippa told the CP. “The cooperation of everyone involved, even parents and students, went as smoothly as possible. With the number of officers on the scene, including fire and rescue, I think that calmed a lot of the parents down. Still, we will critique [our performance] and see if we could have done anything better.”
-CP Staff Report
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