Kentucky Bus Accident Lawyer

Using a bus can be a relief from constantly driving from place to place in Kentucky or having to walk farther than you really want to. You put your child on the bus to start the school day; maybe you use a bus to get to work in the morning. As much as we may want to relax in a bus while leaving the driving to another, the fact is that buses get involved in accidents, sometimes resulting in serious injuries.

In 2015 there were 1,764 accidents involving buses across the state, according to the Kentucky State Police; six of those accidents resulted in fatalities. Bus accidents, especially those involving school buses, are not uncommon.

• Fifteen high school students were injured in a bus accident in Perry County in April 2017, after the driver lost control of the bus when trying to avoid a deer that ran into the street, according to WKYT.
• A school bus without passengers struck a truck head-on in Lexington in February 2017, resulting in one injury, reported WKYT.
• Fifteen school children in a school bus were injured in a collision with a car in Moorestown, New Jersey, in July 2017, reported com.
• A June 2017 accident in Fulton County, Georgia, left a 17-year-old Alabama girl dead, according the Atlanta Journal Courier. The passengers, including the deceased, were members of a church. The driver was charged with second-degree vehicular homicide and failure to maintain lane.

How dangerous are buses?

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports that 134 people die in school vehicle-related accidents annually, reports USA Today. Of these fatalities, only 8% are passengers in the buses. Pedestrians, bicyclists and those outside buses are 21% of fatalities. Nearly three-quarters of the fatalities are those riding in other vehicles.

A student is statistically safer inside a school bus than outside it.

• Of 327 children killed in school bus-related accidents from 2004 to 2015, 54 were passengers in buses.
• Accidents involving school buses, according to NHTSA, are nearly three times more deadly for those in other vehicles.
• The agency found 106 people have been killed while in a school bus. Sixty-one were passengers and 45 were drivers.
• About 480,000 school buses in the country drive an estimated 10 billion miles per year, on average.

A 2010 study by the University of Michigan on driver histories and bus accidents found:

• About 63,000 buses are involved in vehicle accidents annually.
• About 325 accidents result in a fatal injury; 14,000 result in nonfatal injuries; and about 48,000 collisions result only in property damage.
• These numbers are small compared to other vehicles. About 444,000 trucks, four million light vehicles and 6.6 million passenger cars are involved vehicle accidents annually.
• Generally there are about 375 fatalities resulting from bus accidents annually. This includes about fifty bus occupants, 225 occupants of other vehicles, and a hundred pedestrians and bicyclists.
• There are about 5,500 fatalities occurring in accidents involving trucks and a total of about 43,000 fatalities in all vehicle collisions each year.

What role do bus drivers play in Kentucky bus accidents?

A 2012 study in the Journal of Safety Research, “Risk factors Associated with Bus Accident Severity in the United States,” found that buses may not be safer than cars and that the youngest and oldest drivers pose the greatest risks for accidents.

• According to the study, bus accidents are a small part of all motor vehicle accidents in the country (0.6%). If you look at the number of accidents per million passenger miles, for buses it’s 04, which is comparable to that of cars, 3.21.
• The study states that having a young, inexperienced bus driver increases the risk for greater accident severity and that risk also increases when a driver is older than 55, with the greatest risk increase coming for drivers over 65 years old.
• Compared to drivers between 35 and 55 years old, having a driver older than 65 increases the chances of minor injuries by 18.6%, of severe non-incapacitating injuries by 33.1%, of severe incapacitating injuries by 52.3% and of fatal injuries by 18.0%.

What should I do if I’m injured in a Kentucky bus accident?

Many buses are owned and operated by government entities, and there are different rules for filing legal actions against the government for negligence, so you need to act as quickly as possible.

If you or a loved one has been injured in a Kentucky bus accident, you should seek the services of an experienced motor vehicle accident litigator such as Julie Butcher. Call us at (859) 233-3641 or fill out the online contact form so we can talk about the incident, the injuries, the applicable laws and your best options to obtain compensation.