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- 12224389 Home
- 12224395 Weather
Driver charged in Chattanooga school bus crash that killed five children
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. – At least five students were killed in an elementary school bus crash in Chattanooga, according to officials.
Photos released by the Chattanooga Fire Department display the bus split in half by a tree. They said several patients had to be extricated from the bus after it crashed just before Three:30 p.m. No other cars were involved.
The fire department said at least twenty three children were injured and taken to the hospital. The bus was carrying harshly thirty five children from Woodmore Elementary School.
Late Monday night, police arrested school bus driver Johnthony Walker and charged him with five counts of vehicular homicide, reckless driving and endangerment.
Chattanooga school bus driver Johnthony Walker arrested overnight,charged w/ five counts of vehicular homicide, reckless driving & endangerment pic.twitter.com/UDSURezAw1
Three victims in the crash were in the 4th grade, one in very first grade and one in kindergarten.
Six surviving children are in the ICU and six are in the hospital.
Chaplain Dwight Wilson told Channel Two's Rikki Klaus that he pleaded with and comforted two families at Erlanger Children's Hospital Monday night.
"We ministered shortly to a family whose child died. A lot of anger in some cases," Wilson said. "Emotions will range high and low."
He said they packaged their arms around each other and the family thanked him.
Wilson said they also comforted a family whose child survived the crash.
"They were blubbering their eyes out, but we thanked God for that one that lived," he said. "It's never effortless. It's just never effortless."
Chattanooga police say speed is being investigated "very, very strongly" as a factor in the crash.
"It is a complicated crime scene that covers a significant area. I can't tell you if there were any issues (with road conditions). There were none that hopped out. Right now it emerges that one contributing factor may be speed but that is part of an active, ongoing investigation," CPD Chief Fred Fletcher said.
Fletcher said the federal government, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and several others have reached out to suggest assistance. The NTSB tweeted Monday night that it will be investigating the crash on Tuesday.
A blood donation center in Chattanooga had a line out the door after asking for donations for crash victims.
The Chattanooga mayor said the number five "is a cursed number in our city."
In 2015, a gunman released a barrage of gunfire at two military facilities in Chattanooga, killing at least four Marines and wounding a soldier and a police officer, officials said. The shooter also was killed.