Washington
—
A truck driver’s “inattention and failure to respond” to site visitors slowing down in entrance of him caused a multivehicle crash that killed six people and injured 41, the National Transportation Safety Board concluded in a remaining report printed Wednesday.
On November 14, 2023, a Mid State Systems tractor trailer touring west on Ohio’s I-70 did not decelerate for a site visitors backup that shaped after an earlier crash, the NTSB reported. The semi slammed into the slow-moving automobiles at 72 miles an hour, which triggered a chain-reaction collision.
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The truck first hit an SUV however went over it and slammed into the again of a motorcoach. The bus then hit an SUV, spinning it to the aspect earlier than slamming into one other truck. Even earlier than the automobiles stopped shifting a fireplace broke out, which shortly unfold to the again three automobiles.
The bus, which was carrying college students from the Tuscarawas Valley Local School District to a band efficiency, did not have seat belts for passengers.
Three college students on the motorcoach and three mother or father chaperones and a instructor in considered one of the SUVs had been killed. The truck driver had minor accidents.
The NTSB might not decide why the truck driver was not paying attention, the report famous.
Contributing to the crash was authorities’ lack of a technique to watch and talk the site visitors slowdown, the report decided.
An in-vehicle monitoring system, which might have helped return the truck driver’s attention to the roadway, and the velocity distinction between the truck and the slow-moving site visitors additionally contributed, the NTSB concluded.
The board issued eight new security suggestions and reiterated two earlier suggestions. They known as for stronger federal steering on managing site visitors queues and communications between businesses, efficiency requirements for collision avoidance know-how in industrial automobiles, necessities for driver monitoring techniques in industrial automobiles and extra rigorous inside fireplace security requirements for motorcoaches.
The Ohio Department of Transportation was additionally urged to implement a statewide technique for the use of variable velocity limits, the place site visitors will be slowed in the occasion of congestion.
The board additionally advisable the faculty district prioritize bus operators that present and require the use of seat belts.