New York tour bus crash on highway leaves 5 passengers dead : NPR
The first speakers work to save the victims at the scene of a tourist bus that crashed and turned into New York State near Pembroke, NY on Friday.
Libby March / Buffalo News / AP
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Libby March / Buffalo News / AP
A tourist bus returning to New York from Niagara Falls with 54 people on board crashed and rolled out on Friday on an interstate highway, killing five passengers and injuring many others, the authorities announced.
The driver was apparently distracted, lost control and overorrated before the bus entered the right shoulder and no longer turned before 12:30 p.m. on the east side of the Interstate 90 in Pembroke, New York, about 25 km east of Buffalo, the state police, Major Andre Ray, at a conference on evening news. He did not say how the driver was distracted, adding that the cause remains under investigation.
Ray said that passengers age from 1 to 74 years old. Several people were ejected from the bus during the accident, and five people – all adults – were declared dead on the scene, said Ray. Many others have been trapped in the wreckage and have been rescued. Dozens were taken to hospitals. Ray said he didn’t seem to have other people had been deadly.
“An absolute tragedy took place,” said Ray. “And above all, our thoughts, our prayers and our hearts go to the people involved, to their friends and their families.”
State police said that most of the bus passengers were of Indian, Chinese and Philippine origin, and that the authorities brought translators to help the emergency response.
Ray said that a preliminary investigation had excluded a mechanical failure or a driver’s disability. The driver survived the accident and cooperated with the police, officials said. No accusation had been filed on Friday evening, said Ray.
The Mercy Flight Medical Transport said that its three helicopters and three other services transported by people on the accident site. Hospitals in the region said they have evaluated or treated more than 40 people. The wounds went from the head trauma to the broken arms and legs.
Two people who needed surgery at ERIE County Medical Center in Buffalo had to recover, said Dr. Jeffrey Brewer, head of surgery.
State police said that the bus belonged to M & Y Tour Inc. in the New York district of Staten Island. A message asking for comments was left to a registration by phone for the company.
At a previous press conference, soldier James O’Callaghan said he seemed that most people on the bus were not wearing a seat belt.
In response to another bus accident in New York in 2023, a state law requires use of the seat belt on charter bus built on November 28, 2016 or after.
The New York State Thruway Authority said that a long section of the road has been closed in both directions and that drivers were invited to avoid the area. The tracks in the west was reopened later during the day.
“There was glass everywhere on the road and people of people on the whole road,” Powell Stephens from Medina at Buffalo News told the accident. “The windows have all been broken.”
New York Governor Kathy Hochul said on the social platform X that she had been informed of “the tragic tourist bus accident” and that his office worked with the police and local officials.
