Carrollton bus disaster
Encyclopedia
The Carrollton, Kentucky bus collision was one of the deadliest bus disasters in United States history.
About 11:00 p.m. EDT
on Saturday May 14, 1988, Larry Mahoney, a drunk driver in a pickup truck traveling in the wrong direction on an interstate highway in a rural, unincorporated area of Carroll County, Kentucky
collided head-on with a gasoline-powered former school bus
which was in use as a church
bus
. The initial crash was exacerbated when the gasoline from the ruptured fuel tank of the bus ignited immediately after impact, which also blocked the front loading door. Difficulties encountered by the victims attempting to evacuate the crowded bus quickly in the smoke and darkness through the only other designated exit, the rear emergency door, resulted in the death of 27 people and injured 34 of 67 passengers. Six passengers escaped without significant injury. Mahoney also sustained injuries.
In the aftermath of the disaster, several family members of victims became active leaders of Mothers Against Drunk Driving
(MADD), and one became national president of the organization (Karolyn Nunnallee
). The standards for both operation and equipment for school buses and similar buses were improved in Kentucky and many other states, notably increased emergency exits, better structural integrity, and less volatile fuel.
Other safety issues remain to be addressed. Flammability of materials used in bus seating must also be factored with cost, durability and performance of the foam in impact situations. Another unresolved issue is the lack of requirements for occupant restraints such as seat belt
s in larger capacity school buses.
On Interstate 71
, the crash site is marked with a highway sign erected by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
(KYTC). Even twenty years later, memorial items such as crosses and flower arrangements are placed at the site by families and friends. As of November 2010, the Carrollton crash remains the worst bus crash in U.S. history tied for fatalities with the Prestonsburg bus disaster
which occurred 30 years earlier in Floyd County, Kentucky
in 1958.
in Radcliff, Kentucky
boarded their church activity bus and headed to Kings Island
theme park
(north of Cincinnati, Ohio
, about 170 miles from Radcliff). The group included church members and their invited guests. As everyone arrived early that Saturday morning, those wanting to go on the trip had grown to more than originally anticipated. The church's principal pastor (who stayed behind) restricted the ridership to the legal limit of 66 persons plus the driver.
model. The 1977 Ford
B-700 school bus chassis was equipped with a Superior
school bus body, a model with 11 rows of 39 in. (99 cm) wide seats on either side of a central aisle 12 in. (30 cm) wide. The bus was ordered by the Kentucky Department of Schools in 1976, as part of an order of over 600 units for districts throughout the state.
The chassis was manufactured at Ford's expansive Kentucky Truck Plant located outside Louisville
and then was shipped to Lima, Ohio
, where the body was installed at Sheller Globe Corporation's Superior Coach Company. It was certified as a school bus with an effective build date of March 23, 1977, which is when the chassis began production, as required by federal regulations. Both the vehicle, defined as a school bus
, and the build date were important legal distinctions. March 23 was just nine days before fuel tank guard frames and greater access to emergency exits and a number of other improved safety standards, notably better clear space access to rear emergency exits, were required by revised federal regulations on all school buses built for use in the U.S. with beginning production dates of the chassis on or after April 1, 1977.
The completed bus was delivered in time for use during the 1977-78 school year, and served ten years. The church acquired the used school bus
as surplus from the Meade County, Kentucky
School District
, and it had been owned by the church for about one year. The bus had successfully made the same round-trip to Kings Island in July, 1987, was used daily for short local moves on school days, and had made several other long trips. It was checked over regularly by mechanically-inclined church members, including a civilian motor pool supervisor from nearby Fort Knox
. Two new tires of a good commercial quality had been installed a week before the ill-fated trip, and front end suspension and steering parts examined at that time. From all indications, the bus was in good condition mechanically on May 14, 1988.
of the church who was a local court clerk. The group left the church early that morning and traveled uneventfully to the park. They spent the whole day and early evening at Kings Island, then boarded the bus and began traveling out of Ohio and back into Northern Kentucky
toward Radcliff. After about an hour, they stopped to fill the 60-gallon (227-litre) fuel tank
with gasoline
, then resumed the trip southward.
outside of Carrollton, Kentucky
, the bus collided almost head-on with a black Toyota pickup truck
which was traveling the wrong way (north in the southbound lanes) at a high speed on a curved stretch of the highway. The small truck was driven by Larry Wayne Mahoney, a 34 year-old factory worker who was intoxicated.
The right front of the pickup truck hit the right front of the bus, breaking off the bus's suspension and driving the leaf spring
backward into the gas tank mounted behind an exterior panel but outside the heavier frame, just behind the step well for the front door rendering the door inoperable. Leaking gasoline from the punctured tank was ignited by sparks caused from metal parts of the suspension scraping along the road. As the seat covers and the highly flammable polyurethane
foam padding ignited, the temperature inside the bus rose to an estimated 2,000 degrees and a thick cloud of noxious smoke enveloped the area from the ceiling down to seat level within a minute or two.
Almost all of the occupants of the bus began trying to exit through the single rear emergency door. Exceptions were the driver, one chaperone who was said by many survivors to have tried to douse the flames with the bus' fire extinguisher, and another chaperone, a small-bodied woman who managed to squeeze out a 9 in. x 24 in. (23 cm x 61 cm) window opening on the left side immediately adjacent to her seating position near the front. Of the four adults aboard the bus, she was the only survivor. Attempts by some of the other passengers to break or kick out any of the split-sash type side windows were unsuccessful.
According to the NTSB investigation, more than 60 persons trying to reach the only available exit—the rear emergency door—created a crush of bodies in the 12 in. (30 cm) aisle. Many passengers found themselves unable to move. A beverage cooler which had been earlier placed in the aisle near row 10 (of 11 rows of seats) further exacerbated this problem.
Passersby and some of the escaped passengers helped to extract immobilized children through the rear door, and help them to ground level about 3 ft (1 m) below. However, fire soon engulfed the entire interior of the bus, trapping the 27 people remaining aboard. At that point, no more passengers were accessible from outside the bus. Emergency vehicles had not yet arrived.
Armory in Carrollton. There, The KSP went through the interior of the bus seat by seat to find and remove bodies. Many bodies were found facing the only exit, the rear door. The coroner later determined that none of the bus occupants suffered broken bones or mortal injuries from the crash impact; all had died from the fire and smoke.
Among the bus survivors, one person's leg from just below the knee had to be amputated, and about ten others suffered disfiguring burns. Only 6 bus passengers were uninjured and virtually all suffered varied degrees of emotional trauma and survivor guilt
syndrome. When authorities were able to tally the counts from the various hospitals and the bodies aboard the bus, and autopsies had been conducted, it was determined that 27 persons had been killed by the fire, and another 34 aboard the bus injured, as well as the truck driver who was also injured. As of February 2010, this collision had the highest death and injury toll of any school bus crash in United States history; an accident near Prestonsburg, Kentucky
in 1958 also claimed 27 lives, but not as many additional injuries.
responded, conducted an investigation and issued a report on March 28, 1989.
while passengers began to evacuate through the center rear emergency door, squeezing through the narrow opening between the two rear seats and jumping approximately 3 feet to the ground. The front door was blocked by collision damage, and there were no emergency exit windows or roof hatches, as found on commercial buses and some school buses of the time. Only one adult, a woman who was of small stature, managed to escape through a nine-inch opening side window. When she looked back up from the ground, the window opening was filled with flames. The other three adults aboard, including Pearman, died.
Survivors stated that after emptying the small fire extinguisher, Pearman helped some of the many children find their way down the narrow and dark aisle to the only practical way out of the smoke-filled bus. Several older boys attempted to kick out side windows without success. A pileup of passengers formed in and adjacent to the twelve inch aisle leading to the rear door, which was partially blocked by seat backs from the last row and a cooler stored in the aisle near row 10.
Many of those who made it to the area adjacent to rear door were wedged in so tightly that passersby helped pull children out from the human jam at the rear emergency door by force. However, within four minutes or less, the entire bus was on fire, and soon the exodus of passengers stopped. At that point, the passersby who had stopped to help could not reach those still aboard due to the raging fire, and turned their efforts to tending to the crowd of 40 stunned and mostly injured survivors.
and those involving the same vehicle after it was released from school service, but continued to be used for transporting passengers in non-school use. (Had the bus been built new in March 1977 for the non-school use such as a church activity bus, the applicable federal motor vehicle standards in place at that time would have required it to have been built with more emergency exits than were required for school buses). One of the NTSB recommendations after the Carrollton Bus Disaster was that school buses have no fewer emergency exits than required of non-school buses.
Some states also require that the usually different seating capacities for children and adults be displayed near the service door of school buses and non-school buses. Most states consider secondary school (middle and high school) age students to be adults with regards to the space occupied in bus seats and aisles by their bodies.
of Louisville, Kentucky
received the 1989
Pulitzer Prize for General News Reporting
for its coverage.
Following the NTSB report, and much sooner in many instances, many federal, state, and local agencies and bus manufacturers changed regulations, vehicle features, and operating practices.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving
, a grassroots
organization, worked both before and after the Carrollton crash to reduce the hazards created by drunk (or drinking) drivers. Two mothers of Carrollton victims became national president and vice president of the organization.
There was considerable civil litigation. Ford Motor Company
, Sheller-Globe Corporation
, and others eventually contributed to settlements with all victims and/or their families.
The collision and its aftermath, including efforts of some of the families to obtain more than financial settlements, were chronicled by author James S. Kunen in his 1994 book Reckless Disregard: Corporate Greed, Government Indifference, and the Kentucky School Bus Crash.
"Contributing to the severity of the accident was the puncture of the bus fuel tank and ensuing fire in the bus, the partial blockage by the rear bench seats of the area leading to the rear emergency door which impeded rapid passenger egress, and the flammability of the materials in the bus seat cushions."
"The safety issues discussed in the report include:
once before. His blood alcohol concentration (BAC) the night of the crash was .24 percent—substantially more than the 1988 Kentucky legal limit of .10. Mahoney had no memory of the crash and learned of the collision after waking in the hospital the next day.
He was sentenced to imprisonment for 16 years after a jury of the Carroll Circuit Court
, under Indictment No. 88-CR-27, convicted him of 27 counts of manslaughter
in the second degree, 16 counts of assault in the second degree, 27 counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree, and one count of driving while under the influence of intoxicants. At trial, he was represented by the Cleveland, Ohio criminal defense lawyer, William L. Summers
. On appeal, in Case No. 1988-CA-1635, Judge Anthony M. Wilhoit of the Kentucky Court of Appeals
reversed Mahoney's conviction for drunk driving on the grounds that it constituted double jeopardy
under the Kentucky Constitution
, ruling that the 27 counts of manslaughter in the second degree subsumed the drunk driving conviction. The court ruled that, under Kentucky law, the elements of drunk driving were substantially similar to those of manslaughter. This meant that Mahoney's driver's license could be reinstated, even during his imprisonment. The Kentucky Supreme Court
subsequently reversed this line of reasoning in another case, Justice v. Commonwealth, 987 S.W.2d 306 (Ky. Dec 17, 1998). On May 6, 1992, the Kentucky Supreme Court denied review of Mahoney's appeal in Case No. 1992-SC-98.
At the Kentucky State Reformatory
, Mahoney worked in the medium-security facility as a janitor
. He earned his GED
high school
equivalency diploma
and participated in Alcoholics Anonymous
and Narcotics Anonymous
programs. Described by authorities as a model prisoner, Mahoney reduced his incarceration by six years with good behavior, known under Kentucky law as "good time" credit. He declined the Kentucky Parole Board's parole recommendation and served out his sentence, before leaving the prison in La Grange
, on September 1, 1999, having served 10 years and 11 months. Local television stations broadcast video of him walking out of the prison.
That week, according to a published account in The Courier-Journal
(Louisville), some survivors of the crash and families of the victims had said that they were willing to forgive Mahoney though the disaster marked forever the congregation of the First Assembly of God, which had many members on the bus. "I feel a little bit sorry for him", Katrina Henderson, then 23, told The Courier-Journal in 1998. "He didn't wake up one day and say 'I'm going to kill 27 people.' That's not to take any blame away from him. I think that he is a person who made some very bad choices and he paid for those choices", said Henderson, who was age 12 when she survived the wreck. The victims were members of a church, and many felt called to forgive him, as forgiveness
is a tenet of Christianity
.
During his trial, the idea was discussed that Mahoney could save lives by talking to school groups, but Mahoney has so far declined.
According to a story by The Cincinnati Enquirer in 2003, Mahoney was living in quiet, self-imposed obscurity in rural Owen County, Kentucky
, about ten miles (16 km) from the crash site. He has been working at North American Stainless (NAS) since shortly after his release from prison.
One of the victims, the youngest killed on the fatal bus, was 10 year-old Patricia "Patty" Susan Nunnallee. Patty's mother, Karolyn Nunnallee
became an active member of MADD
after the crash, eventually becoming MADD's national president. Patty's mother wrote on MADD's memorial web page to Patty: They were traveling on a school bus, so I thought she'd be safe.
Janey Fair, whose 14 year old daughter Shannon was killed, become a national lobbyist for MADD, and rose within the organization to become a member of the Board of Directors and is a national vice-president. She is also head of the Kentucky Victims Coalition. According to the MADD website, "MADD helped me find my inner strength and see that life could go on", Janey said. "I have found I can make real changes in people's attitudes about drinking and driving and in how our government addresses this critical problem. Additionally, I can help other victims move forward in their lives." Her husband also became active locally in MADD.
Joy Williams, wife of Lee Williams, a pastor of the church, and their two young daughters, Kristen and Robin, were among those killed. Dotty Pearman's husband, John Pearman was associate pastor at the church and the bus driver, was also was killed while their daughter, Christy, was involved in the crash and survived.
In the year after the crash, Lee Williams and Dotty Pearman, who barely knew each other before the crash, became friends and eventually married.
Lee and Dotty Williams also volunteer for MADD. Lee is a former chapter president of MADD in Hardin County, Kentucky
, and Dotty is the current president. The couple often speaks to school groups, assists with health fairs and participates in other local events. "If I can persuade one person not to drink and drive, I've won", said Dotty. "I especially think it is important to educate children early on about the dangers of drinking and driving. We need to address the issue of alcohol with youth before it becomes a problem."
Buses used by Kentucky schools must also have a cage around the fuel tank, a stronger frame and roof to resist crumpling on impact and rollover, high-backed seats, extra seat padding, a fuel system that slows leaks, flame-retardant seats and floors, reflective tape on all emergency exits, and strobe lights on the exterior. Schools also must have a diesel-powered fleet.
In 1991, Kentucky enacted stricter drunk driving laws.
Kentucky°N date=June 2009°W
About 11:00 p.m. EDT
Eastern Standard Time
Eastern Standard Time may refer to:*North American Eastern Time Zone, UTC-5*Australian Eastern Standard Time, UTC+10*An album by Hip Hop group Kooley High...
on Saturday May 14, 1988, Larry Mahoney, a drunk driver in a pickup truck traveling in the wrong direction on an interstate highway in a rural, unincorporated area of Carroll County, Kentucky
Carroll County, Kentucky
Carroll County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky and located at the confluence of the Kentucky and Ohio rivers. It was formed in 1838 and named for Charles Carroll of Carrollton, the last living signer of the Declaration of Independence. The population was 10,155 at the 2000 census...
collided head-on with a gasoline-powered former school bus
School bus
A school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
which was in use as a church
Christian Church
The Christian Church is the assembly or association of followers of Jesus Christ. The Greek term ἐκκλησία that in its appearances in the New Testament is usually translated as "church" basically means "assembly"...
bus
Bus
A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...
. The initial crash was exacerbated when the gasoline from the ruptured fuel tank of the bus ignited immediately after impact, which also blocked the front loading door. Difficulties encountered by the victims attempting to evacuate the crowded bus quickly in the smoke and darkness through the only other designated exit, the rear emergency door, resulted in the death of 27 people and injured 34 of 67 passengers. Six passengers escaped without significant injury. Mahoney also sustained injuries.
In the aftermath of the disaster, several family members of victims became active leaders of Mothers Against Drunk Driving
Mothers Against Drunk Driving
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a non-profit organization in the United States that seeks to stop drunk driving, support those affected by drunk driving, prevent underage drinking, and overall push for stricter alcohol policy...
(MADD), and one became national president of the organization (Karolyn Nunnallee
Karolyn Nunnallee
Karolyn Nunnallee was the seventh president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving , serving 1998-1999. Ms. Nunnallee's ten-year-old daughter, Patty Nunnallee, was killed in the Carrollton bus disaster in 1988...
). The standards for both operation and equipment for school buses and similar buses were improved in Kentucky and many other states, notably increased emergency exits, better structural integrity, and less volatile fuel.
Other safety issues remain to be addressed. Flammability of materials used in bus seating must also be factored with cost, durability and performance of the foam in impact situations. Another unresolved issue is the lack of requirements for occupant restraints such as seat belt
Seat belt
A seat belt or seatbelt, sometimes called a safety belt, is a safety harness designed to secure the occupant of a vehicle against harmful movement that may result from a collision or a sudden stop...
s in larger capacity school buses.
On Interstate 71
Interstate 71
Interstate 71 is an Interstate Highway in the Great Lakes/Midwestern and Southeastern region of the United States. Its southern terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 64 and Interstate 65 in Louisville, Kentucky. Its northern terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 90 in Cleveland,...
, the crash site is marked with a highway sign erected by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
Kentucky Transportation Cabinet
The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet is Kentucky's state-funded agency charged with building and maintaining U.S...
(KYTC). Even twenty years later, memorial items such as crosses and flower arrangements are placed at the site by families and friends. As of November 2010, the Carrollton crash remains the worst bus crash in U.S. history tied for fatalities with the Prestonsburg bus disaster
Prestonsburg bus disaster
The collision and plunge into a river involving a school bus near Prestonsburg, Kentucky on February 28, 1958, was the most disastrous bus accident in United States history.-Summary:...
which occurred 30 years earlier in Floyd County, Kentucky
Floyd County, Kentucky
Floyd County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It was formed in 1800. As of 2000, the population was 42,441. Its county seat is Prestonsburg. The county is named for Colonel John Floyd .-History:...
in 1958.
The bus, driver, and Church Day at Kings Island
On May 14, 1988, a youth group consisting of mostly teenagers (most of whom attended North Hardin High School) and four adults from First Assembly of GodAssemblies of God
The Assemblies of God , officially the World Assemblies of God Fellowship, is a group of over 140 autonomous but loosely-associated national groupings of churches which together form the world's largest Pentecostal denomination...
in Radcliff, Kentucky
Radcliff, Kentucky
Radcliff is a city in Hardin County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 21,961 at the 2000 census. It is included in the Elizabethtown, Kentucky Metropolitan Statistical Area....
boarded their church activity bus and headed to Kings Island
Kings Island
Kings Island is a amusement park located northeast of Cincinnati in Mason, Ohio. Opened in 1972 by Taft Broadcasting Company and now owned by Cedar Fair Entertainment Company, Kings Island is the most visited seasonal amusement park in the U.S...
theme park
Amusement park
thumb|Cinderella Castle in [[Magic Kingdom]], [[Disney World]]Amusement and theme parks are terms for a group of entertainment attractions and rides and other events in a location for the enjoyment of large numbers of people...
(north of Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...
, about 170 miles from Radcliff). The group included church members and their invited guests. As everyone arrived early that Saturday morning, those wanting to go on the trip had grown to more than originally anticipated. The church's principal pastor (who stayed behind) restricted the ridership to the legal limit of 66 persons plus the driver.
The school bus
The church bus was a conventional type body-on-chassis school busSchool bus
A school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
model. The 1977 Ford
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...
B-700 school bus chassis was equipped with a Superior
Superior Coach Company
Superior Coach was once a school bus body and professional car manufacturer, but today it focuses on building hearses and is located in Lima in Allen County, Ohio.-History:-Garford Motor Truck Company:...
school bus body, a model with 11 rows of 39 in. (99 cm) wide seats on either side of a central aisle 12 in. (30 cm) wide. The bus was ordered by the Kentucky Department of Schools in 1976, as part of an order of over 600 units for districts throughout the state.
The chassis was manufactured at Ford's expansive Kentucky Truck Plant located outside Louisville
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...
and then was shipped to Lima, Ohio
Lima, Ohio
Lima is a city in and the county seat of Allen County, Ohio, United States. The municipality is located in northwestern Ohio along Interstate 75 approximately north of Dayton and south-southwest of Toledo....
, where the body was installed at Sheller Globe Corporation's Superior Coach Company. It was certified as a school bus with an effective build date of March 23, 1977, which is when the chassis began production, as required by federal regulations. Both the vehicle, defined as a school bus
School bus
A school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
, and the build date were important legal distinctions. March 23 was just nine days before fuel tank guard frames and greater access to emergency exits and a number of other improved safety standards, notably better clear space access to rear emergency exits, were required by revised federal regulations on all school buses built for use in the U.S. with beginning production dates of the chassis on or after April 1, 1977.
The completed bus was delivered in time for use during the 1977-78 school year, and served ten years. The church acquired the used school bus
School bus
A school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
as surplus from the Meade County, Kentucky
Meade County, Kentucky
As of the census of 2000, there were 26,349 people, 9,470 households, and 7,396 families residing in the county. The population density was . There were 10,293 housing units at an average density of...
School District
School district
School districts are a form of special-purpose district which serves to operate the local public primary and secondary schools.-United States:...
, and it had been owned by the church for about one year. The bus had successfully made the same round-trip to Kings Island in July, 1987, was used daily for short local moves on school days, and had made several other long trips. It was checked over regularly by mechanically-inclined church members, including a civilian motor pool supervisor from nearby Fort Knox
Fort Knox
Fort Knox is a United States Army post in Kentucky south of Louisville and north of Elizabethtown. The base covers parts of Bullitt, Hardin, and Meade counties. It currently holds the Army Human Resources Center of Excellence to include the Army Human Resources Command, United States Army Cadet...
. Two new tires of a good commercial quality had been installed a week before the ill-fated trip, and front end suspension and steering parts examined at that time. From all indications, the bus was in good condition mechanically on May 14, 1988.
The trip before the crash
On the trip, the bus was driven by John Pearman, a part-time associate pastorPastor
The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....
of the church who was a local court clerk. The group left the church early that morning and traveled uneventfully to the park. They spent the whole day and early evening at Kings Island, then boarded the bus and began traveling out of Ohio and back into Northern Kentucky
Northern Kentucky
Northern Kentucky is the name often given to the northernmost counties in Kentucky...
toward Radcliff. After about an hour, they stopped to fill the 60-gallon (227-litre) fuel tank
Fuel tank
A fuel tank is safe container for flammable fluids. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propelled or released into an engine...
with gasoline
Gasoline
Gasoline , or petrol , is a toxic, translucent, petroleum-derived liquid that is primarily used as a fuel in internal combustion engines. It consists mostly of organic compounds obtained by the fractional distillation of petroleum, enhanced with a variety of additives. Some gasolines also contain...
, then resumed the trip southward.
The crash
Just before 11:00 p.m., while heading south on Interstate 71Interstate 71
Interstate 71 is an Interstate Highway in the Great Lakes/Midwestern and Southeastern region of the United States. Its southern terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 64 and Interstate 65 in Louisville, Kentucky. Its northern terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 90 in Cleveland,...
outside of Carrollton, Kentucky
Carrollton, Kentucky
Carrollton is a town in Carroll County, Kentucky, at the confluence of the Ohio River and the Kentucky River. Its population was 3,846 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Carroll County....
, the bus collided almost head-on with a black Toyota pickup truck
Pickup truck
A pickup truck is a light motor vehicle with an open-top rear cargo area .-Definition:...
which was traveling the wrong way (north in the southbound lanes) at a high speed on a curved stretch of the highway. The small truck was driven by Larry Wayne Mahoney, a 34 year-old factory worker who was intoxicated.
The right front of the pickup truck hit the right front of the bus, breaking off the bus's suspension and driving the leaf spring
Leaf spring
Originally called laminated or carriage spring, a leaf spring is a simple form of spring, commonly used for the suspension in wheeled vehicles...
backward into the gas tank mounted behind an exterior panel but outside the heavier frame, just behind the step well for the front door rendering the door inoperable. Leaking gasoline from the punctured tank was ignited by sparks caused from metal parts of the suspension scraping along the road. As the seat covers and the highly flammable polyurethane
Polyurethane
A polyurethane is any polymer composed of a chain of organic units joined by carbamate links. Polyurethane polymers are formed through step-growth polymerization, by reacting a monomer with another monomer in the presence of a catalyst.Polyurethanes are...
foam padding ignited, the temperature inside the bus rose to an estimated 2,000 degrees and a thick cloud of noxious smoke enveloped the area from the ceiling down to seat level within a minute or two.
Evacuation difficulties
Nobody aboard the bus was seriously injured by the actual collision. However, the primary front loading door of the bus was jammed shut by impact damage and blocked by the fire which began immediately thereafter.Almost all of the occupants of the bus began trying to exit through the single rear emergency door. Exceptions were the driver, one chaperone who was said by many survivors to have tried to douse the flames with the bus' fire extinguisher, and another chaperone, a small-bodied woman who managed to squeeze out a 9 in. x 24 in. (23 cm x 61 cm) window opening on the left side immediately adjacent to her seating position near the front. Of the four adults aboard the bus, she was the only survivor. Attempts by some of the other passengers to break or kick out any of the split-sash type side windows were unsuccessful.
According to the NTSB investigation, more than 60 persons trying to reach the only available exit—the rear emergency door—created a crush of bodies in the 12 in. (30 cm) aisle. Many passengers found themselves unable to move. A beverage cooler which had been earlier placed in the aisle near row 10 (of 11 rows of seats) further exacerbated this problem.
Passersby and some of the escaped passengers helped to extract immobilized children through the rear door, and help them to ground level about 3 ft (1 m) below. However, fire soon engulfed the entire interior of the bus, trapping the 27 people remaining aboard. At that point, no more passengers were accessible from outside the bus. Emergency vehicles had not yet arrived.
Transporting injured, removing those killed
After fire, rescue, and Kentucky State Police responded to the scene, treated and transported survivors, and extinguished the fire, a crane was used to load the bus onto a flatbed truck that transported the bus and those persons killed to the National GuardUnited States National Guard
The National Guard of the United States is a reserve military force composed of state National Guard militia members or units under federally recognized active or inactive armed force service for the United States. Militia members are citizen soldiers, meaning they work part time for the National...
Armory in Carrollton. There, The KSP went through the interior of the bus seat by seat to find and remove bodies. Many bodies were found facing the only exit, the rear door. The coroner later determined that none of the bus occupants suffered broken bones or mortal injuries from the crash impact; all had died from the fire and smoke.
Among the bus survivors, one person's leg from just below the knee had to be amputated, and about ten others suffered disfiguring burns. Only 6 bus passengers were uninjured and virtually all suffered varied degrees of emotional trauma and survivor guilt
Survivor guilt
Survivor, survivor's, or survivors guilt or syndrome is a mental condition that occurs when a person perceives themselves to have done wrong by surviving a traumatic event when others did not...
syndrome. When authorities were able to tally the counts from the various hospitals and the bodies aboard the bus, and autopsies had been conducted, it was determined that 27 persons had been killed by the fire, and another 34 aboard the bus injured, as well as the truck driver who was also injured. As of February 2010, this collision had the highest death and injury toll of any school bus crash in United States history; an accident near Prestonsburg, Kentucky
Prestonsburg, Kentucky
Prestonsburg is a city in and the county seat of Floyd County, Kentucky, United States. It lies in the eastern part of the state, along the banks of the Levisa Fork of the Big Sandy River. It was founded in 1797 by Col. John Preston—for whom it was named—along with Solomon Stratton, Matthias...
in 1958 also claimed 27 lives, but not as many additional injuries.
NTSB report of the collision
The National Transportation Safety BoardNational Transportation Safety Board
The National Transportation Safety Board is an independent U.S. government investigative agency responsible for civil transportation accident investigation. In this role, the NTSB investigates and reports on aviation accidents and incidents, certain types of highway crashes, ship and marine...
responded, conducted an investigation and issued a report on March 28, 1989.
NTSB Summary
- "About 10:55 p.m. EDT on May 14, 1988, a pickup truck traveling northbound in the southbound lanes of Interstate 71 struck head-on a church activity bus traveling southbound in the left lane of the highway near Carrollton, Kentucky. As the pickup truck rotated during impact, it struck a passenger car traveling southbound in the right lane near the church bus. The church bus fuel tank was punctured during the collision sequence, and a fire ensued, engulfing the entire bus. The bus driver and 26 bus passengers were fatally injured. Thirty-four bus passengers sustained minor to critical injuries, and six bus passengers were not injured. The pickup truck driver sustained serious injuries, but neither occupant of the passenger car was injured."
Post-collision actions
When fire first broke out immediately after the collision, bus driver John Pearman tried to put it out with a small fire extinguisherFire extinguisher
A fire extinguisher or extinguisher, flame entinguisher is an active fire protection device used to extinguish or control small fires, often in emergency situations...
while passengers began to evacuate through the center rear emergency door, squeezing through the narrow opening between the two rear seats and jumping approximately 3 feet to the ground. The front door was blocked by collision damage, and there were no emergency exit windows or roof hatches, as found on commercial buses and some school buses of the time. Only one adult, a woman who was of small stature, managed to escape through a nine-inch opening side window. When she looked back up from the ground, the window opening was filled with flames. The other three adults aboard, including Pearman, died.
Survivors stated that after emptying the small fire extinguisher, Pearman helped some of the many children find their way down the narrow and dark aisle to the only practical way out of the smoke-filled bus. Several older boys attempted to kick out side windows without success. A pileup of passengers formed in and adjacent to the twelve inch aisle leading to the rear door, which was partially blocked by seat backs from the last row and a cooler stored in the aisle near row 10.
Many of those who made it to the area adjacent to rear door were wedged in so tightly that passersby helped pull children out from the human jam at the rear emergency door by force. However, within four minutes or less, the entire bus was on fire, and soon the exodus of passengers stopped. At that point, the passersby who had stopped to help could not reach those still aboard due to the raging fire, and turned their efforts to tending to the crowd of 40 stunned and mostly injured survivors.
School bus and church bus standards and regulations
A contributing factor to the crash itself and the severity seemed to be loopholes between the laws and procedures for a school busSchool bus
A school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
and those involving the same vehicle after it was released from school service, but continued to be used for transporting passengers in non-school use. (Had the bus been built new in March 1977 for the non-school use such as a church activity bus, the applicable federal motor vehicle standards in place at that time would have required it to have been built with more emergency exits than were required for school buses). One of the NTSB recommendations after the Carrollton Bus Disaster was that school buses have no fewer emergency exits than required of non-school buses.
Some states also require that the usually different seating capacities for children and adults be displayed near the service door of school buses and non-school buses. Most states consider secondary school (middle and high school) age students to be adults with regards to the space occupied in bus seats and aisles by their bodies.
Media coverage, book
Among the many media agencies which provided thorough coverage, which has extended even to the 10th and 15th anniversaries of the disaster, The Courier-JournalThe Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal, locally called "The C-J", is the main newspaper for the city of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. According to the 1999 Editor & Publisher International Yearbook, the paper is the 48th largest daily paper in the United States and the single largest in Kentucky.- Origins :The...
of Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...
received the 1989
1989 Pulitzer Prize
-Journalism awards:*Public Service:**Anchorage Daily News, for reporting about the high incidence of alcoholism and suicide among native Alaskans in a series that focused attention on their despair and resulted in various reforms.*General News Reporting:...
Pulitzer Prize for General News Reporting
Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting
The Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting is a Pulitzer Prize awarded for a distinguished example of breaking news, local reporting on news of the moment...
for its coverage.
Following the NTSB report, and much sooner in many instances, many federal, state, and local agencies and bus manufacturers changed regulations, vehicle features, and operating practices.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving
Mothers Against Drunk Driving
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a non-profit organization in the United States that seeks to stop drunk driving, support those affected by drunk driving, prevent underage drinking, and overall push for stricter alcohol policy...
, a grassroots
Grassroots
A grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures...
organization, worked both before and after the Carrollton crash to reduce the hazards created by drunk (or drinking) drivers. Two mothers of Carrollton victims became national president and vice president of the organization.
There was considerable civil litigation. Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...
, Sheller-Globe Corporation
Sheller-Globe Corporation
Sheller-Globe Corporation was a U.S. auto parts manufacturer and industrial conglomerate based in Toledo, Ohio. Formed in 1966 on a heritage of much older companies, Sheller-Globe grew through the acquisition of many other businesses before it was acquired by United Technologies Corporation in...
, and others eventually contributed to settlements with all victims and/or their families.
The collision and its aftermath, including efforts of some of the families to obtain more than financial settlements, were chronicled by author James S. Kunen in his 1994 book Reckless Disregard: Corporate Greed, Government Indifference, and the Kentucky School Bus Crash.
NTSB summary conclusion
The NTSB determined "the probable cause of the collision between the pickup truck and the church activity bus was the alcohol-impaired condition of the pickup truck driver who, operated his vehicle opposite to the direction of traffic flow on an interstate highway.""Contributing to the severity of the accident was the puncture of the bus fuel tank and ensuing fire in the bus, the partial blockage by the rear bench seats of the area leading to the rear emergency door which impeded rapid passenger egress, and the flammability of the materials in the bus seat cushions."
"The safety issues discussed in the report include:
- effects of alcohol on driver performance,
- effectiveness of driving-under-the-influence program in Kentucky,
- current Federal standards used in school bus manufacture,
- flammability and toxicity of school bus seating materials,
- emergency egress on school buses, and
- fuel system integrity of school buses"
Larry Mahoney
Mahoney had been arrested for DUIDUI
DUI is a three letter acronym that may stand for:* Driving under the influence * Democratic Union for Integration — the largest ethnic Albanian party in the Republic of Macedonia* Data Use Identifier...
once before. His blood alcohol concentration (BAC) the night of the crash was .24 percent—substantially more than the 1988 Kentucky legal limit of .10. Mahoney had no memory of the crash and learned of the collision after waking in the hospital the next day.
He was sentenced to imprisonment for 16 years after a jury of the Carroll Circuit Court
Kentucky Circuit Courts
The Kentucky Circuit Courts are the state courts of general jurisdiction in the U.S. state of Kentucky.The Circuit Courts are trial courts with original jurisdiction in cases involving capital offenses, felonies, land disputes, contested probates of wills, and civil lawsuits in disputes with an...
, under Indictment No. 88-CR-27, convicted him of 27 counts of manslaughter
Manslaughter
Manslaughter is a legal term for the killing of a human being, in a manner considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is said to have first been made by the Ancient Athenian lawmaker Dracon in the 7th century BC.The law generally differentiates...
in the second degree, 16 counts of assault in the second degree, 27 counts of wanton endangerment in the first degree, and one count of driving while under the influence of intoxicants. At trial, he was represented by the Cleveland, Ohio criminal defense lawyer, William L. Summers
William L. Summers
William L. Summers is an American criminal defense lawyer who served as lead defense counsel for Larry Mahoney in the Carrollton, Kentucky bus collision case. He was admitted to the practice of law in the State of Ohio in 1969, the State of Kentucky in 1988, and has also been admitted to practice...
. On appeal, in Case No. 1988-CA-1635, Judge Anthony M. Wilhoit of the Kentucky Court of Appeals
Kentucky Court of Appeals
The Kentucky Court of Appeals is the lower of Kentucky's two appellate courts, under the Kentucky Supreme Court. Prior to a 1975 amendment to the Kentucky Constitution the Kentucky Court of Appeals was the only appellate court in Kentucky....
reversed Mahoney's conviction for drunk driving on the grounds that it constituted double jeopardy
Double jeopardy
Double jeopardy is a procedural defense that forbids a defendant from being tried again on the same, or similar charges following a legitimate acquittal or conviction...
under the Kentucky Constitution
Kentucky Constitution
The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Kentucky is the document that governs the Commonwealth of Kentucky. It was first adopted in 1792 and has since been rewritten three times and amended many more...
, ruling that the 27 counts of manslaughter in the second degree subsumed the drunk driving conviction. The court ruled that, under Kentucky law, the elements of drunk driving were substantially similar to those of manslaughter. This meant that Mahoney's driver's license could be reinstated, even during his imprisonment. The Kentucky Supreme Court
Kentucky Supreme Court
The Kentucky Supreme Court was created by a 1975 constitutional amendment and is the state supreme court of the commonwealth of Kentucky. Prior to that the Kentucky Court of Appeals was the only appellate court in Kentucky...
subsequently reversed this line of reasoning in another case, Justice v. Commonwealth, 987 S.W.2d 306 (Ky. Dec 17, 1998). On May 6, 1992, the Kentucky Supreme Court denied review of Mahoney's appeal in Case No. 1992-SC-98.
At the Kentucky State Reformatory
Kentucky State Reformatory
Kentucky State Reformatory is a medium-security prison for adult males. The prison is located in unincorporated Oldham County, Kentucky, near La Grange, and about northeast of Louisville. It was established in 1936 to replace the Kentucky State Reformatory located in Frankfort after a flood...
, Mahoney worked in the medium-security facility as a janitor
Janitor
A janitor or custodian is a professional who takes care of buildings, such as hospitals and schools. Janitors are responsible primarily for cleaning, and often some maintenance and security...
. He earned his GED
GED
General Educational Development tests are a group of five subject tests which, when passed, certify that the taker has American or Canadian high school-level academic skills...
high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
equivalency diploma
Diploma
A diploma is a certificate or deed issued by an educational institution, such as a university, that testifies that the recipient has successfully completed a particular course of study or confers an academic degree. In countries such as the United Kingdom and Australia, the word diploma refers to...
and participated in Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous is an international mutual aid movement which says its "primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics achieve sobriety." Now claiming more than 2 million members, AA was founded in 1935 by Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith in Akron, Ohio...
and Narcotics Anonymous
Narcotics Anonymous
Narcotics Anonymous is a twelve-step program modeled after Alcoholics Anonymous describing itself as a "fellowship or society of men and women for whom drugs had become a major problem," and it is the second-largest 12-step organization...
programs. Described by authorities as a model prisoner, Mahoney reduced his incarceration by six years with good behavior, known under Kentucky law as "good time" credit. He declined the Kentucky Parole Board's parole recommendation and served out his sentence, before leaving the prison in La Grange
La Grange, Kentucky
As of the census of 2000, there were 5,676 people, 2,216 households, and 1,502 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,514.8 people per square mile . There were 2,330 housing units at an average density of 621.8 per square mile...
, on September 1, 1999, having served 10 years and 11 months. Local television stations broadcast video of him walking out of the prison.
That week, according to a published account in The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal, locally called "The C-J", is the main newspaper for the city of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. According to the 1999 Editor & Publisher International Yearbook, the paper is the 48th largest daily paper in the United States and the single largest in Kentucky.- Origins :The...
(Louisville), some survivors of the crash and families of the victims had said that they were willing to forgive Mahoney though the disaster marked forever the congregation of the First Assembly of God, which had many members on the bus. "I feel a little bit sorry for him", Katrina Henderson, then 23, told The Courier-Journal in 1998. "He didn't wake up one day and say 'I'm going to kill 27 people.' That's not to take any blame away from him. I think that he is a person who made some very bad choices and he paid for those choices", said Henderson, who was age 12 when she survived the wreck. The victims were members of a church, and many felt called to forgive him, as forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness is typically defined as the process of concluding resentment, indignation or anger as a result of a perceived offense, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution. The Oxford English Dictionary defines forgiveness as 'to grant free pardon and to give up all...
is a tenet of Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
.
During his trial, the idea was discussed that Mahoney could save lives by talking to school groups, but Mahoney has so far declined.
According to a story by The Cincinnati Enquirer in 2003, Mahoney was living in quiet, self-imposed obscurity in rural Owen County, Kentucky
Owen County, Kentucky
As of the census of 2000, there were 10,547 people, 4,086 households, and 2,995 families residing in the county. The population density was . There were 5,345 housing units at an average density of...
, about ten miles (16 km) from the crash site. He has been working at North American Stainless (NAS) since shortly after his release from prison.
MADD and Drunk Driving prevention
The collision riveted the nation's attention on the problem of drunken driving like never before and has been credited in part with causing the steady decline in the number of alcohol-related fatalities.One of the victims, the youngest killed on the fatal bus, was 10 year-old Patricia "Patty" Susan Nunnallee. Patty's mother, Karolyn Nunnallee
Karolyn Nunnallee
Karolyn Nunnallee was the seventh president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving , serving 1998-1999. Ms. Nunnallee's ten-year-old daughter, Patty Nunnallee, was killed in the Carrollton bus disaster in 1988...
became an active member of MADD
Mothers Against Drunk Driving
Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a non-profit organization in the United States that seeks to stop drunk driving, support those affected by drunk driving, prevent underage drinking, and overall push for stricter alcohol policy...
after the crash, eventually becoming MADD's national president. Patty's mother wrote on MADD's memorial web page to Patty: They were traveling on a school bus, so I thought she'd be safe.
Janey Fair, whose 14 year old daughter Shannon was killed, become a national lobbyist for MADD, and rose within the organization to become a member of the Board of Directors and is a national vice-president. She is also head of the Kentucky Victims Coalition. According to the MADD website, "MADD helped me find my inner strength and see that life could go on", Janey said. "I have found I can make real changes in people's attitudes about drinking and driving and in how our government addresses this critical problem. Additionally, I can help other victims move forward in their lives." Her husband also became active locally in MADD.
Joy Williams, wife of Lee Williams, a pastor of the church, and their two young daughters, Kristen and Robin, were among those killed. Dotty Pearman's husband, John Pearman was associate pastor at the church and the bus driver, was also was killed while their daughter, Christy, was involved in the crash and survived.
In the year after the crash, Lee Williams and Dotty Pearman, who barely knew each other before the crash, became friends and eventually married.
Lee and Dotty Williams also volunteer for MADD. Lee is a former chapter president of MADD in Hardin County, Kentucky
Hardin County, Kentucky
As of the census of 2000, there were 94,174 people, 34,497 households, and 25,355 families residing in the county. The population density was . There were 37,673 housing units at an average density of...
, and Dotty is the current president. The couple often speaks to school groups, assists with health fairs and participates in other local events. "If I can persuade one person not to drink and drive, I've won", said Dotty. "I especially think it is important to educate children early on about the dangers of drinking and driving. We need to address the issue of alcohol with youth before it becomes a problem."
Changes in Kentucky
Kentucky now requires all school buses to have nine emergency exits—more than any other federal or state standard. This includes front and back doors, a side door, four emergency windows and two roof exits. The bus that crashed at Carrollton had only front and back exits, and 11 rows of 39" seats, including the crucial area near the rear door.Buses used by Kentucky schools must also have a cage around the fuel tank, a stronger frame and roof to resist crumpling on impact and rollover, high-backed seats, extra seat padding, a fuel system that slows leaks, flame-retardant seats and floors, reflective tape on all emergency exits, and strobe lights on the exterior. Schools also must have a diesel-powered fleet.
In 1991, Kentucky enacted stricter drunk driving laws.
Memorials
- Ford Motor Company paid for a black marble memorial in North Hardin Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Radcliff, Kentucky. The stone lists the names of all of the persons who were aboard the bus during the crash.
- The Kentucky Department of Transportation has 2 small signs, 1 in each direction of I-71, reading "SITE OF FATAL BUS CRASH MAY 14, 1988" at the site of the crash. There has been some controversy over the signs. There has been a newspaper story and a website with comments, including that of one of the survivors.
See also
- School busSchool busA school bus is a type of bus designed and manufactured for student transport: carrying children and teenagers to and from school and school events...
- Church bus and school bus safety
- Wayne CorporationWayne CorporationWayne Corporation was a large manufacturer of buses and other vehicles branded with the trade name "Wayne." The corporate headquarters were in Richmond, Indiana, in Wayne County, Indiana, in the United States...
- History of a different school bus manufacturer with information about bus safety engineering
External links
- http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20116497,00.html Article about Mahoney's sentencing, 1990
- Daily Egyptian at Southern Illinois University Carbondale has a large number of stories on drunk driving, and some on this incident specifically.
- A film, The Phoenix, produced in June 2004, is a dramatic feature film in pre-production that explores the story of Harold Dennis, one of the bus survivors. The film is to recount Dennis' recovery and subsequent success as a footballAmerican footballAmerican football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
player at the University of KentuckyKentucky WildcatsThe Kentucky Wildcats are the men's and women's intercollegiate athletic squads of the University of Kentucky , a founding member of the Southeastern Conference...
following the crash. - A news story from 2003 about Larry Mahoney
- School Bus Fleet Magazine Official website another place with a comprehensive listing of links, this site also includes access to a user forum where anyone can ask questions and get help and advice on line
- US DOT, National Highway Safety and Traffic Administration official website
- National Coalition For School Bus Safety official website
- Church Business Magazine: Driving Into The Danger Zone – Minimize The Risks Of Transporting Children
- Cincinnati Enquirer (1998): 10th Anniversary of 1988 Bus Crash, with links
- Cincinnati Enquirer (1998): Larry Mahoney on the 10th Anniversary of 1988 Bus Crash
- Cincinnati Enquirer (May 2003): Drunken driver lives in obscurity
- Pentecostal Evangel (February 29, 2004): Inferno on Interstate 71
- Google Map Streetview of site of crash
Kentucky°N date=June 2009°W