‘Seat belts saved their lives’: Several recovering after bus accident

COLUMBUS COUNTY, NC (WWAY) — Several people are recovering after a crash on Highway 74/76 Tuesday in Columbus County involving a school bus, tractor trailer and FedEx truck.

“This is probably one of the most severe that we’ve had in a number of years,” Acme-Delco-Riegelwood Fire Chief Steve Camlin said.

Camlin says it could have been a deadly crash, but thankfully things ended differently.

“Very lucky to walk away, because if he had stayed straight, there would have been fatalities,” Camlin said. “No ifs, ands or buts.”

Camlin says there’s one reason why things ended the way they did.

“The seat belts absolutely saved their lives.”

A neighbor who came out to the scene after the crash calls it a miracle.

“It’s something you don’t forget,” nearby neighbor Yolanda Graham said. “It was actually hard to imagine that there hadn’t been something more tragic than what occurred.”

According to Highway Patrol, the driver of an 18-wheeler looked down while heading west on Highway 74/76. When he looked up, the Head Start school bus had stopped.

Investigators say he tried to swerve, but hit the bus, which flipped over. A FedEx truck also clipped the bus.

“I actually thought that there were more cars involved than the ones that everyone mentioned were involved, just because it sounded so horrific and looked so catastrophic,” Graham said.

Trooper T.W. Inman with Highway Patrol says one child had a broken arm and another had a concussion.

That’s why Camlin wants every school bus to have seat belts.

“Because these seats did save lives,” he said. “There was not one seat that was destroyed other than the impact zone.”

Camlin says this was a good outcome from a scary scene.

“If those seat belts hadn’t have been there, they would’ve been ejected,” he said. “Then the outcome would’ve been much, much more severe.”

Highway Patrol says the driver of the 18-wheeler, Daniel Musick, was working out of Statesville.

They say he was charged with failure to reduce speed, but the investigation is ongoing.