Tragedy hits school bus

I first started at the Bemidji (Minn.) Pioneer as an intern in the summer of 1996. That would begin six years as a news reporter, sports reporter and copy editor for a small, six-day-per-week daily newspaper in northern Minnesota. I wrote a large range of stories from multiple beats, to features to sports, my favorite being the coverage of the Red Lake Reservation High School basketball team named the Warriors. Here is a collection of my stories from my time at the Pioneer.

May 16, 1997

By Devlyn Brooks

Staff Writer

Three Bemidji students and an East Grand Forks flood evacuee student were hospitalized Thursday after a Bemidji School District school bus rolled over on Highway 2 west of Bemidji on the way to classes, according to the State Patrol in Thief River Falls.

Twelve-year-old Jessica Kranschuck, an East Grand Forks student attending school in the Bemidji district, was airlifted from North Country Regional Hospital to St. Luke's Hospital in Fargo, N.D., in serious condition, but was later classified by a hospital spokeswoman as in satisfactory condition.

Ryan Buchhalz, 14, of Solway and Christina Lorshbough, 14, of Pinewood were admitted to North Country Regional Hospital for injuries, but were in stable condition Thursday night. And Julie Schmidt, 14, also of Solway was admitted to NCRH for a possible concussion, and was in guarded condition. All three were held Thursday night.

The remaining 18 students and bus driver Arvid Hill were treated and released from the Bemidji hospital with various minor injuries.

The accident occurred about two miles west of Bemidji after the eastbound bus drove onto the shoulder of the highway, entered the ditch, then was brought back onto the pavement. After hitting the pavement, the bus slid back into the eastbound ditch, turned over and came to a rest facing westward, according to the State Patrol.

The 1986 International bus sustained moderate damage, the dispatcher said.

According to Hill, who has been a driver for the district for seven years, the steering in the bus gave way, and he could no longer control the bus.

"All of a sudden, the bus just went," a shaken Hill said in a telephone interview.

Employees of L&M Fleet, who were some of the first on hand, described the scene immediately after the 8 a.m. accident, as chaotic.

Donna Thurk, who was in the break room at the store, said she looked through the window and saw a car come screeching to a halt in the store's parking lot, and she figured some kind of accident had happened.

Thurk and several other employees raced out of the store to the ditch about 100 yards away, some with sleeping bags in hand, to help comfort the children, she said. Another employee called 911 before leaving the store.

"I looked out the window and saw a bus, and I said, 'You know it's going to be loaded with kids. So run,'" said Thurk, standing next to a pile of opened sleeping bags stacked at L&M Fleet.

Some of the kids were already unloaded and sitting in the ditch when the Fleet employees arrived, she said, but other students were still being unloaded by First Responders.

"The bus driver was in shock, and yet he was still getting kids out off the bus," she said, still a bit dazed from the morning incident. "There were people everywhere, and a lot of motorists were stopping. All we wanted was to cover those kids up with something. ... It wasn't a very good way to start the day."

Another Fleet employee, Lori Drummond, rode with two of the students in an unmarked police car to North Country Regional Hospital to comfort the children.

Two girls Drummond rode with "were really shaken up, and one of the girls was wanting to know how her brother was. He seemed to have been hurt badly," she said.

"We went over there to try to help as much as we could -- to try to comfort them as much as we could," she added. "Chaotic wasn't even the word (to describe the scene). It was more like a dream ... like it didn't happen. It was like a nightmare."

According to Bemidji schools Superintendent Rollie Morud, the bus was coming from Solway, and had already dropped off many elementary students at Solway School. Most of the students remaining on the bus were Bemidji High School and Middle School students and a few parochial elementary students.

In an Associated Press story, Morud said it was a "terrible situation, but the response ... was outstanding," referring to the law enforcement and hospital staffs involved and the Fleet employees who responded to help.

Morud said school officials were at the hospital after the accident to talk with parents of children in the accident, but he declined to comment further about the accident. District Transportation Coordinator Ken Willms did not return telephone calls Thursday by a reporter.

"What happened was pretty bad in my book," said Hill, who reported being stiff and sore after the accident. "I still haven't gotten over it. It's hard getting used to something like that."