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Mock Bus Accident Drills Rescue Workers

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By RONNIE BLAIR rblair@tampatrib.com

The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 28, 2009

NEW PORT RICHEY - Pasco County school officials and emergency agencies joined forces Friday morning to practice for a scenario they would prefer not to face - a school bus accident with a dead driver and injured students.

The emergency and school personnel, assisted by 40 student volunteers, played out the mock accident in a Gulf High School parking lot where a day earlier they had turned an out-of-commission school bus on its side to help set the stage.

"I call this 'what-if' training," said Lt. Brian Prescott, who supervises school resource officers for the Pasco County Sheriff's Office.

He said it was important to run the drill to improve the chances things move smoothly when a real accident happens.

"These school buses transport the most precious resource on earth - our children," Prescott said. "They aren't transporting watermelons."

The school district has 430 buses with about 36,000 students riding daily.

Cpl. Shane Collier, a school resource officer who helped plan the drill, said any flaws in the system discovered during the exercise would be discussed later in the day.

In addition to the sheriff's office and school district, other agencies participating included Pasco County Emergency Management, Pasco Fire Rescue, the New Port Richey Police Department and Community Hospital of New Port Richey.
Emergency planners tried to work as many real-life details into the scenario as possible, including upset parents who kept trying to slip past deputies to get to the students.

"We are actually transporting the kids to the hospital," Collier said.

The injured students were portrayed by 23 drama students from Mitchell High School and 17 members of the sheriff's Explorers unit. They wore makeup to better highlight their fake injuries and lend an air of realism to the scene.

"This is the first time we've done something this elaborate as putting a bus on its side," Prescott said.

Many school administrators and transportation route specialists aren't used to seeing anything as traumatic as a serious bus crash, so it was important for them to be involved so they can "get their wits about them" when the real thing happens, Prescott said.

Diego Espinosa, a route specialist who played the deceased driver, said one of the worst bus accidents he ever responded to involved a bus and a Cadillac on Seven Springs Boulevard a few years ago.

The bus nearly rolled over, but managed to stay upright, he said.

"That was pretty bad," Espinosa said.

The scene set up Friday was similar to a real crash that happened in December 2003 when a pickup slammed into a bus on Chancey Road in Zephyrhills, knocking the bus on its side, said Tad Kledzik, the school district's supervisor of transportation maintenance.

The pickup driver was killed and 15 people were injured in that accident.

Reporter Ronnie Blair can be reached at (813) 948-4218.

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