School bus flips in crash, injuring 4 middle schoolers, Maryland cops say. ‘Terrifying’
Four middle school students were hurt when their school bus overturned in Maryland, police said.
There were 19 students on board when, “for an unknown reason,” the bus ran off the road and flipped in Columbia, according to the Howard County Police Department. Officers responded to the crash just after 3:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 8.
Videos of the scene taken by WJLA show the large yellow bus on its side in a field. No other vehicles were involved in the crash, authorities said.
Of the 19 students on board, police said two girls and two boys — between 11 and 14 years old — were evaluated at a hospital. Their conditions weren’t known as of Friday, Feb. 9.
“It had to be completely terrifying for the kids,” Danica Pelgram, who lives near where the crash occurred, told WBAL-TV.
The students were from Hammond Middle School in nearby Laurel, according to Howard County Public Schools. District officials addressed the “significant bus accident” in a statement Thursday.
“Several students were injured and are receiving medical care as needed,” the district said. “All students have been reunited with their families.”
Howard County police spokesperson Sherry Llewellyn told WBAL-TV that the students who were taken to a hospital “were really transported for mechanism of injury, meaning that they may have hit their heads in the crash.”
The bus driver, a 30-year-old woman, was not hurt, police said. Authorities are investigating what caused the crash but said impairment doesn’t appear to be a factor.
Columbia is about 20 miles southwest of downtown Baltimore.
This story was originally published February 9, 2024 at 3:43 PM with the headline "School bus flips in crash, injuring 4 middle schoolers, Maryland cops say. ‘Terrifying’."