At least 10 dead in California, as bus, truck collide head-on

At least 10 people died, many of them high school students, after a tractor-trailer slammed into a tour bus with college hopefuls on a campus tour in Northern California on Thursday, local police said.

More than 30 others were injured after the driver of a FedEx truck lost control, crossed a divider on Interstate 5, sideswiped a car, then smashed head-on into the tour bus around 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, California Highway Patrol spokeswoman Tracy Hoover said.

Apart from the driver, the bus was carrying between 44 and 48 students and three or four chaperones heading to Humboldt State University for a college tour, CHP spokeswoman Lacey Heitman said.

The crash occurred near the community of Orland, 150 km north of Sacramento.

The drivers of the FedEx truck and tour bus were killed, CHP and the university said. Eight students on the bus were among the dead, a local ABC affiliate reported.

Investigators said the truck driver may have been trying to avoid a passenger car that also was involved in the crash, which shut down north- and southbound freeway traffic.

The students, traveling from Los Angeles-area high schools, were part of a program the university said "brings low-income and first-generation prospective college students from the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas to HSU's campus".

"They are traumatized, absolutely. Most of them have scratches, cuts, burns, contusions and lacerations - a magnitude of injuries," Hoover said.

Photos from the scene showed the bus reduced to a burned-out chassis resting sideways across the highway. Yellow tarps appeared to be draped over bodies in the wreckage.

Hoover described hunks of twisted metal and broken glass and said flames had roared through the vehicles.

"The big rig and the bus were both engulfed in flames. You are talking about two vehicles that are destroyed. There is hardly anything left of the truck," Hoover said.

More than 30 people were taken by air and land ambulances to area hospitals, CHP said. Shasta Regional Medical Center, which received two patients, said one was in stable condition while the other was undergoing testing and additional treatment.

Eleven people were taken to Enloe Medical Center in Chico, where two were listed in critical condition, three in fair condition and five in good condition, a hospital nursing supervisor said. One survivor's condition was undetermined.

An official at Mercy Medical Center in Redding said the hospital treated and released five patients.

The condition of the rest was not immediately known.

No one in the car was killed, though the driver was taken to the hospital with unspecified injuries, CHP said.

Bonnie Kourvelas, a spokeswoman for FedEx Corp, said the company was aware of media reports that one of its trucks was involved in the crash. The condition of the truck's driver, she said, was unknown.

"We are cooperating fully with authorities as they investigate," she said.

Reuters-AP

(China Daily 04/12/2014 page6)