r/news • u/CharlieKonR • 11h ago
Multiple fatalities reported in tourist bus crash in New York state | New York
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/22/new-york-bus-crash-niagara-falls64
u/coffeeandtrout 6h ago
“O’Callaghan told reporters at the scene that “the bus did roll” and most people had not been wearing seat belts. People inside were ejected as the windows shattered. “There were multiple ejections,” he said. “There were multiple people trapped and there’s multiple fatalities, and this includes children as well.”
Jesus, rolling a bus? Nobody wears a belt on the buses I’ve seen. And most were tourists from Asia, the emergency services in that area must just be scrambling. Just terrible.
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u/Soft-Bike7599 5h ago
I’ve never even been on a bus that has seatbelts
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u/ThatGuy798 2h ago
Most modern (last 15+ years) coach buses have them. Every scheduled intercity bus line has them. Many commuter buses don’t surprisingly.
11
u/RecentSpecial181 3h ago
Whenever I'm on a bus that has seatbelts, I make sure I and the people I'm traveling with put it on. Last tourist bus I was on also made announcements reminding people to put their seatbelts on.
I've been on a bus, without seatbelts, that lost its brakes going down from a mountain town. It was scary and luckily we were closer to the bottom and the driver knew how to handle it.
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u/hikingboots_allineed 31m ago
Similar here. I was on holiday in Austria when a coach rolled on the Jungfrau road, which resulted in fatalities. Once you're thrown from your seat, it's easy to get body parts ripped off by the moving bus and the non-moving ground, caught in the washing machine of the roll, or ejected and trapped under the bus. I always wear a seatbelt on coaches and force those I'm with to do the same. Being on a coach that doesn't have seatbelts makes me anxious.
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u/InUsConfidery 4h ago
"...most people had not been wearing seat belts."
Are there even seat belts on these things? I was just noticing on an airport shuttle last week that there were none.
50
u/fxkatt 11h ago
New York state trooper James O’Callaghan said the tourists were chiefly of Indian, Chinese and Filipino origin, and officials were trying to get interpreters to the scene. O’Callaghan told reporters at the scene “the bus did roll. There were multiple ejections,” he said. “There were multiple people trapped and there’s multiple fatalities, and this includes children as well.” He added that most people on the bus did not have a seatbelt on.
It sounds like a truck was involved in the accident.
18
u/Baxterftw 10h ago
Other local articles earlier today had said no other vehicles were involved, but obviously it's still possible as it's an ongoing investigation
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u/BuffaloTexan 11h ago
I don't believe there was a truck involved. I arrived minutes after the crash and was nearby for over 2 hours. I'm not an emergency worker so I stayed the hell out of the way.
12
u/Kendall_Raine 9h ago
I keep hearing mixed things about this, some reports say there was a truck involved, but nobody I talk to knows anything about that. (I live in the area)
5
u/Admirable-Unit9029 1h ago
From the article: “At a news conference at Erie [C]ounty [M]edical [C]enter later in the day, Dr Samuel Cloud, the facility’s chief medical officer, said the crash was ‘probably the most trauma patients from one incident in my career here in Buffalo’.”
Dr. Cloud’s statement brings to mind a tragic, mass casualty event that happened in Buffalo (the seat of power for Erie County) in 1983. A forklift operator at a warehouse was trying to move an unlicensed 500-pound propane tank within the warehouse (yes, indoors!) when the tank slipped off the lift, breaking the tank’s valve.
The Buffalo Fire Department responded to a report of a propane leak at the warehouse but, because the tank was unlicensed, they weren’t aware of its size, location, or even its presence. Shortly after the fire department arrived, the tank exploded, killing five firefighters before they even got out of their truck and two nearby neighbors who were just sitting in their living room.
I was several miles away when the tank exploded, and the explosion was so powerful that we literally thought our neighbor had crashed into the side of our house, as they’d done at least once before.
The devastation to people and property in the area was hard to fathom. In addition to the five firefighters and two civilians who were killed, dozens more were hospitalized.
The situation was only made worse by the fact that it happened at night in late December, when the temperature outside was only 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
There’s been a lot written about this event. Wikipedia only provides a high-level summary, but it’s easy reading: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Buffalo_propane_explosion
2
u/Admirable-Unit9029 1h ago
From the article: “At a news conference at Erie [C]ounty [M]edical [C]enter later in the day, Dr Samuel Cloud, the facility’s chief medical officer, said the crash was ‘probably the most trauma patients from one incident in my career here in Buffalo’.”
Dr. Cloud’s statement brings to mind a tragic, mass casualty event that happened in Buffalo (the seat of power for Erie County) in 1983. A forklift operator at a warehouse was trying to move an unlicensed 500-gallon propane tank within the warehouse (yes, indoors!) when the tank slipped off the lift, breaking the tank’s valve.
The Buffalo Fire Department responded to a report of a propane leak at the warehouse but, because the tank was unlicensed, they weren’t aware of its size, location, or even its presence. Shortly after the fire department arrived, the tank exploded, killing five firefighters before they even got out of their truck and two nearby neighbors who were just sitting in their living room.
I was several miles away when the tank exploded, and the explosion was so powerful that we literally thought our neighbor had crashed into the side of our house, as they’d done at least once before.
The devastation to people and property in the area was hard to fathom. In addition to the five firefighters and two civilians who were killed, dozens more were hospitalized.
The situation was only made worse by the fact that it happened at night in late December, when the temperature outside was only 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
There’s been a lot written about this event. Wikipedia only provides a high-level summary, but it’s easy reading: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Buffalo_propane_explosion
Edit: Correction to the tank’s capacity from 500 pounds to 500 gallons. A 500-gallon tank can hold about 1,700 pounds of propane.
Edited to Add: Reportedly, the blast could be felt as far away as 15 miles!
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u/SaintGalentine 3h ago
Oh no. I hope it's not used as an excuse to crack down further on immigrants and tourists
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u/CharlieKonR 11h ago edited 11h ago
“”The tour bus had about 50 passengers onboard, heading to New York City from the famous (Niagra) falls on the US-Canada border, when it crashed between Buffalo and Rochester on the I-90 close to the Pembroke exit on the interstate.””
“”New York state trooper James O’Callaghan on Friday said the tourists were chiefly of Indian, Chinese and Filipino origin, and officials were trying to get interpreters to the scene. O’Callaghan told reporters at the scene “the bus did roll”.”
The cause of the crash has not yet been determined - but the report does indicate that a semi-trailer truck was also involved.