Any motor vehicle accident has the potential to be dangerous. Heavy metal vehicles that crash into one another at any speed, and if those vehicles are traveling at a high rate of speed, the results can be catastrophic.
A motor vehicle accident that happened in Pleasantville on Memorial Day serves as a grim reminder of this. A sedan carrying five teenagers crossed the center line on Franklin Boulevard and hit a New Jersey Transit bus head-on. Two passengers in the car were killed in the accident; a third teenager died overnight as a result of her injuries.
Meanwhile, several people on the bus were injured in the crash as well. The bus was on its way to Hamilton Mall on what was a day off for many people. According to officials, 10 people on the bus were injured in the accident.
It wasn’t clear what led the car to cross the center line, but it apparently did so at a high rate of speed. In fact, according to people on the street who witnessed the accident, the car was traveling around 60 mph. The speed limit on that stretch of road is just 25 mph.
For as bad as the accident was, it is fortunate that it was not worse. The driver of the bus, in an effort to avoid the head-on collision, instinctively attempted to swerve out of the way of the incoming sedan. However, this put several people on the sidewalk in danger when the bus came close to striking them.
Source: NBC Philadelphia, “Another Teen Dies After Crash With NJ Transit Bus,” David Chang and Dan Stamm, May 27, 2014