A routine ride home from reading week ended with a bus flipped on its side.
At approximately 7:15 p.m. on Feb. 22, police officers were alerted that a Rider Express coach bus carrying 47 people had crashed on Highway 401 east of Napanee, rolling into a ditch and landing on its side.
While no one was seriously injured, in a media release, the OPP claimed that at least eight passengers sustained minor injuries, including broken bones, dislocations, and lacerations, and were transported to local hospitals. Two Queen’s students have also claimed that some personal items were damaged or lost.
John “Jack” Maillet, Sci ’28, who was also a passenger on the bus, explained to The Journal that he was sitting calmly, minding his own business, when suddenly the vehicle started turning.
“I was very confused, because we were far from any turn offs and exits,” Maillet said. “The bus then fell into the ditch, hit the edge, and after a second of us falling, it flipped. Everyone kind of fell on top of each other, towards the window. Lots of screaming. Everyone freaked out.”
He shared that while everyone near the back, where he was seated, seemed relatively okay, there was a girl quite close to him who seemed to have broken her arm, and others were complaining about pain in their chest and arms.
No official confirmations of these injuries have been announced.
Maillet isn’t positive what led to the crash, explaining that the roads were a bit icy, but “really not that bad.” He shared that one person, who was sitting near the front, told him that the bus was trying to turn into the right lane, when something pulled it over the edge.
“So maybe it was the [icy] road that pulled it over,” he said.
Maillet also observed that nearly everyone on board seemed to be a student, primarily those heading back to Kingston after reading week. He explained that they were all left waiting on the side of the road for about two hours before the City of Kingston sent a bus to retrieve them. On the bus, the city took down information regarding each of their addresses and luggage descriptions and later delivered their suitcases back to them.
At the time of the interview with Maillet on March 2, he hadn’t heard any information from Rider Express, despite both him and other students who were on board continuously contacting the company.
Maillet explained that on March 1, he had even contacted a lawyer, who claimed to have already received multiple calls regarding the incident. The lawyer told Maillet that he also had trouble getting in contact with Rider Express and was unable to obtain information regarding the company’s insurance for students trying to set up physiotherapy appointments.
Rider Express eventually contacted Maillet on March 3, offering a full refund and an additional travel voucher for future use to each passenger. In the e-mail, which was obtained by The Journal, the company offered their “sincere apologies for the distress and inconvenience the situation may have caused.”
When The Journal reached out to Rider Express referencing the crash and asking for any information they had regarding the accident, the company’s President, Firat Uray, offered one line in response: “non [sic] of our buses involved in any accident recently.”
The company hasn’t responded to further e-mails from The Journal asking them to clarify this statement given student testimony.
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