Teen suffered multiple spine fractures in bus crash

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WINNIPEG — A Manitoba high school student was knocked out and suffered multiple spine fractures in a bus crash that has renewed questions about whether seatbelts should be installed on division fleets.

A 17-year-old boy drove a pickup truck into a yellow bus, which was carrying 14 students and ended up on its passenger side in a ditch, 12 kilometres west of Swan Lake, during the morning commute on Feb. 12.

“Kids were thrown from seats. A lot of (related injuries) could’ve been prevented, had they been restrained in their seats,” said a mother whose six-year-old suffered bruises. She didn’t want to be identified publicly.

The collision has shaken community members in the Prairie Spirit School Division, including a grandparent who accuses authorities of downplaying the incident.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police and local school division indicated injuries were reported, but they weren’t life-threatening.

“It came across as a very minimal crash (based on their reports), but to the families involved it was not,” said one grandfather, who asked his name be withheld to protect his teenage grandson’s identity.

He called it “irresponsible” to disregard the severity of the trauma experienced by students and their families.

The students aboard the bus range in level from kindergarten to Grade 11. All of them were safely evacuated around 8:30 a.m. and transferred to the hospital for assessment after the collision.

RCMP reported the driver of the truck was also taken to hospital, treated and released.

The grandfather of a 15-year-old said the teen recalled scrolling on his phone at the back of the bus and abruptly waking up as he was loaded into an ambulance. He was taken to the Children’s Hospital, where he would spend two nights undergoing tests and treatment. He experienced shock and suffered six stress fractures in his spine, along with bumps and scrapes, his grandfather said.

“That’s not ‘minor injuries’ to me,” he added, referencing an RCMP spokesperson’s categorization of the fallout from the incident.

“His hockey days are over for this year. He’s not jumping on trampolines any time soon.”

RCMP media relations officer Michelle Lissel said hospitals generally provide police with generic reports that differentiate between non-life-threatening and serious injuries.

“Whenever we respond to situations like this, we make sure that we’re checking in on everybody because it’s a little bit chaotic,” she said, while acknowledging the crash was “very stressful and scary” for affected students.

The school division’s leader defended internal messaging, which was done in consultation with RCMP, and noted staffers are working with families and making support personnel available.

“Student safety is at the forefront of our planning. Debriefing and followup are a vital part of crisis response; we will continue to assess if any adjustments are needed,” Prairie Spirit Supt. Cheryl Mangin said via email.

The teenage motorist who caused the crash in the Municipality of Lorne has been charged with careless driving under the Highway Traffic Act.

Police have determined the 17-year-old failed to yield while driving south on Road 66 when it collided with the rear driver’s side of an eastbound bus on Road 28.

The mother whose kindergartner daughter was aboard the bus said she wants the province to seriously consider requiring seatbelts on school buses.

“We were lucky,” the mother said, adding she would hope the province acts quickly to improve safety.

Manitoba’s education minister was not made available for comment Friday.

Manitoba Education typically requests incident reports when there is significant damage or students have been injured and undertakes its own investigation to determine “causes and corrective measures,” a provincial spokesperson said in an email.

“When preventative measures are identified that can be applied broadly to other divisions, they are shared amongst divisional transportation supervisors,” they said in a statement that did not confirm whether an investigation is ongoing in Swan Lake.

A rural school bus driver has been meeting with Manitoba Tories in recent months to discuss her concerns about safety gaps.

Interim PC Leader Wayne Ewasko called school bus safety “a non-partisan issue” and hinted he and his colleagues are working on the file.

“I do believe that all MLAs — and because the majority of MLAs are parents or grandparents — we want to see our children, our students, our friends and family, get to and from home safely,” Ewasko said.

Transport Canada does not mandate seatbelts on school buses, owing to the time-intensive challenge of ensuring all children are properly secured and dangers associated with improper use.

“When they are used and installed properly, seatbelts on school buses can offer another layer of safety to complement the existing, highly effective protection provided by compartmentalization,” per the national agency.

Ottawa recognizes that these buses protect children with high back seats made from “energy absorbing material that cushion the impact in a collision.”

The Canada Safety Council’s stance is that they would not improve safety in a majority of crashes and could hinder evacuation.

» Winnipeg Free Press