ORLAND, Calif. — A FedEx truck crossed a grassy freeway median in Northern California and slammed into a bus carrying high school students on a visit to a college. At least nine were killed in the fiery crash, authorities said.
Massive flames could be seen devouring both vehicles just after the crash, and clouds of black smoke billowed into the sky until firefighters had quenched the fire, leaving behind scorched black hulks of metal. Bodies were draped in yellow plastic inside the burned-out bus.
California Highway Patrol dispatchers said the drivers of the tractor-trailer and bus were among the dead, along with seven other people who were riding on the bus.
The crash happened a little after 5:30 p.m. on Interstate 5 near Orland, a small city about 100 miles north of Sacramento.
The bus was one of two that the admissions office at Humboldt State University had chartered to bring prospective students from Southern California to tour the Arcata campus, Humboldt’s Vice President of Administrative Affairs Joyce Lopes said.
University police were trying to determine which school districts the students were from and fielding telephone calls from anxious parents, Lopes said.
“Our hearts go out to those who have been affected, and we are here to support them, and their families, in any way possible,” Humboldt State’s President Rollin Richmond said in a statement on the school’s website.
A CHP dispatcher says the bus and truck were on opposite sides of the freeway when the truck crossed a grass median and slammed into the bus, causing an explosion and fire.
Investigators say the truck driver might have been trying to avoid a passenger car that was also involved in the crash, which shut down north- and south-bound traffic on the freeway.
Bonnie Kourvelas, a FedEx spokeswoman, said in a statement Thursday night: “Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone involved in the tragic accident on I-5 in California. We are cooperating fully with authorities as they investigate.”
A first responder who helped set up a triage at the scene said 36 or 37 people received injuries ranging from severe to minor burns, broken legs and noses and head lacerations.
“The victims were teenage kids. A lot of them were freaked out. They were shocked. They still couldn’t grasp what happened,” Jason Wyman with the Orland Volunteer Fire Department said.
“You hear about it in the news, but you never seen anything like that,” he said.
Wyman said when he drove a water truck to the highway, both the bus and truck were fully engulfed in flames, sending thick, dark smoke into the air.
He said he was first focused on putting out the fire, and once it was under control he saw dozens of people walking wounded.
“The first victim that was taken out of the bus was severely burned,” Wyman said.
Five people were taken to Enloe Medical Center in Chico with minor to moderate injuries; four more were on the way, hospital spokeswoman Christina Chavira said.
Another five were taken to Mercy Medical Center in Redding in fair condition.
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