Earlier this week, three separate accidents involving Houston-area school buses were reported. The first accident occurred on Monday when an Alvin ISD school bus rear-ended a vehicle stopped at a red light at the intersection of State Highway 6 and County Road 99 in Brazoria County, resulting in two fatalities. No students were on board the bus at the time of the accident. The second accident occurred on Tuesday on Highway 288 at Southmore near the Medical Center. Two vehicles reportedly ran into the back of a Houston ISD school bus, causing the bus to leave the roadway. The school bus driver suffered was transported to the hospital, but is expected to make a full recovery. Houston ISD confirmed that there were no students on the bus at the time of the accident. The third accident involving a Crosby ISD school bus occurred on Wednesday. According to Crosby ISD officials, 15 students were on the bus at the time of the accident, but no injuries were reported.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, there were 1,172 fatal school-transportation-related accidents from 2006 to 2015. Since 2014, there has been an average of 673 school bus accidents in Harris County each year. Of those accidents, only 276 citations were issued to school bus drivers. The Texas Department of Transportation crash data from 2014 to 2017 shows that most of these citations came from the same three offenses: failure to control speed (72 citations), failure to yield the right-of-way (54 citations), and failure to drive in a single lane (27 citations).
If you or someone you know has been injured in a bus crash, contact an experienced attorney at Abraham, Watkins, Nichols, Agosto, Aziz & Stogner by calling (713) 222-7211 or toll free at 713-222-7211.