Atlanta School Bus Accident Raises Questions Concerning Bus Safety

Our personal injury lawyers read today about a serious accident case involving an overturned school bus which apparently lost control and overturned about 40 miles north of Atlanta near Canton, Georgia. It was traveling from one high school to a middle school when the accident happened. When the bus overturned, even though no students were ejected from the bus, according to initial reports, approximately 25 students were injured. Two were reported to be in critical condition.
Initial news accounts state that the bus driver apparently lost control of the bus after going around a curve. The bus overturned on its side. It is doubtful that this school bus was equipped with seatbelts. Had the seatbelts been in place, one must wonder whether the two students in critical condition would have been as seriously injured as they apparently were.
Approximately one year ago, another bus ran over the top of an exit ramp crashing off of a bridge onto its side on Interstate Highway 75. This involved the Bluffton University baseball team. There were seven (7) deaths associated with that incident. In that accident, there were no seatbelts available for the baseball team occupants and some of those killed had been ejected. In the most recent case involving the school bus, many were injured and some perhaps critically once again because of joint and concurring driver negligence and the lack of seatbelts.
One must wonder how many more accidents there will have to be before Congress will require seatbelts for school buses and other motor carriers for hire such as commercial buses that one sees almost daily in large metropolitan areas. Until and unless seatbelts are required, our lawyers and the public will regretfully and, in all likelihood, continue to read about preventable injuries to bus occupants.