School bus ripped apart in dump-truck crash, killing 2
Associated Press
MOUNT OLIVE, N.J.
A school bus taking children on a field trip to a historic site collided with a dump truck Thursday, ripping the bus apart and killing a student and a teacher.
The crash left the bus lying on its side on the guardrail of Interstate 80 in Mount Olive, its undercarriage and front end sheared off and its steering wheel exposed. Some of the victims crawled out of the emergency exit in the back and an escape hatch on the roof. More than 40 people were taken to hospitals.
Gov. Phil Murphy said one adult and one student were killed. Their names had not been released. Murphy said the truck driver was hospitalized, but officials didn’t reveal his condition.
The front end of the red dump truck was mangled in the wreck, which took place about 50 miles west of New York. The truck was registered to Mendez Trucking, of Belleville, and had “In God We Trust” emblazoned on the back of it.
The bus had entered westbound Interstate 80 from southbound U.S. Highway 206, police said.
Police didn’t release details of how the crash happened, but the trucking company had a string of crashes in recent years and a higher than average rate of violations that sidelined its vehicles, according to federal safety data.
There were 45 people, including 38 students, on the bus. Forty-three people from the bus and the truck driver were hospitalized, some in critical condition.
The bus was owned by the school district and had seatbelts, according to Paramus schools superintendent Michele Robinson.