Brazoria County school bus crash sends student, driver to hospital
BRAZORIA COUNTY, Texas - A Columbia-Brazoria Independent School District bus driver and a student are hospitalized following a crash in Brazoria County. It happened around 6:45 a.m. on Thursday on County Road 335 and Highway 36.
"It was really bad, really scary," said Javier Nava, one of the bus riders at Columbia High School.
Shocking dash camera footage captures the moment a school bus crashes into a dump truck.
The video appears to show a road crew worker flagging traffic to stop, although it can be difficult to see.
Columbia High School junior, Javier Nava, was sitting in the third row of the bus when the crash happened.
"We were driving, I was kind of dozed off, you know, then I feel swerving, and next thing I see is that we hit something," said Nava.
The impact of the crash jerked students from their seats. The school district said 34 students and the driver were on the bus when the collision happened.
"Then I look up, and we hit a truck, and then the bus just starts getting filled with like smoke, and like we started yelling," said Nava.
Nava said he and his classmates piled out of the emergency exit in the back of the bus to safety. The dump truck’s impact left a gaping hole in the front right side of the bus. The bus driver and a female student were taken to the hospital by LifeFlight.
Student, Natalee Stephenson, said her sister was supposed to be on the bus that crashed Thursday morning, but she was taken to school by their mother at the last minute.
"As you can tell, there’s traffic everywhere. It’s hard for people to drive and that could have been easily my sister on that bus, and that doesn’t make me happy," said Stephenson.
The senior points to nearby construction as the cause of the collision.
"This accident is actually really ridiculous. There’s all this construction going on, and I think if we are going to have all this construction, I think we need to do it not during school hours, because it’s very unsafe," said Stephenson.
Prayers and well wishes poured in for the bus driver and student injured in the crash.
"I just hope everyone is okay, everyone that was involved. My friends, and the bus driver, the girl, I hope everybody is okay," said Nava.
The school district said all the other students on the bus were evaluated and released to their parents or sent back to school. The bus driver and student who were injured were flown to Memorial Hermann Hospital.