Black Monday in Alabama
Yesterday — Monday — was a bad day in Huntsville, AL, where I live. You probably read about it. A school bus with about 45 teen students aboard plunged off of the interstate and fell 30 feet nose first. To date, there are three fatalities, multiple injuries, and a stunned community.
This bus — like most school buses — had no seatbelts. In fact, this accident may be the straw that finally ends that disgraceful practice. In the meantime, you should hear the silly reasons cited as to why school buses don’t have/need seat belts. I thought we settled most of the pros and cons of seatbelts back in the 1950s, but, when it comes to the school buses that carry our children, the arguments are alive and well 50 years later.
The most-cited argument is that school buses have such a good safety record that they obviously don’t need seat belts. Hogwash! You might say the same thing about the airlines, but we are still required to wear seatbelts on board, and rightly so. It has been proved over and again to my complete satisfaction that any means of transportation (with the possible exception of bikes) is safer with seatbelts.
Others say that the buses cannot be fitted with shoulder belts, and that seat belts alone wouldn’t do much good. Horse pucky. Again I hold the airlines up as an example. We PAX wear them. Should we quit?
Other arguments sound as silly as they did in the 1950s — the belt might trap you in the bus. A belt can hurt you. Actually, those arguments sound sillier now than they did in the 1950s, because back then we didn’t know but what they were true. Now we have known better for decades.
Sadly, enough, it seems that the real reason belts aren’t required on school buses is simple economics, that — as my mother would say — is downright sinful.
Seatbelts even on school buses? No, seatbelts especially on school buses.
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Herb–
Now I never heard of that!
I do know one thing–when I was in school they could have–would have–figured out a way to stop that garbage.
Thanks for writing,
Ralph Hood
They would be expensive to replace on a regular basis
The students take delight in cutting them off
They do it on airlines.
I agree with you that they should be manditory .
Bus operators ignor ststistics
Cheers
Daryl–
Thanks so much.
I plan to e-mail your “voice of reason” comment to all of my friends (and enemies). Some of them consider me to be on the brink of madness, rather than reason.
Thanks for commenting.
Ralph Hood
Delphine–
Thanks so much. I didn’t even think about elevators, which are often cited as being the most widely used “free” transportation in this country.
Thanks for commenting.
Ralph Hood
Dear Mr. Hood,
As a long-time reader of your column, thank you, for continuing to be the the voice of reason in an all too often upside-down world! Economics and statistics be damned! Pitiful little funding is devoted to our nations schools as it is, must our childrens’ safety be compromised also?
Sincerely,
Daryl Weller
Mr. Myers–
Yes, I have read all of thiose argumrntd, and I stand by my statement. The verdict is in on seatbelts and has been for decades. They save lives. Period.
Thanks for commenting,
Ralph Hood
Boy, you miss the “slippery slope” implications of seat belts in school buses. 1- The soft padded box around each seat has been proven to be a valuable deterrant to injuries. The stats speak for themselves. Do you really believe that a plungs off a 30 foot overpass would not have resulted in deaths 4even with seat belts? Everyone in an aircraft has a seatbelt and most occupants die in the most common a/c accident, CFIT. 2- Seatbelts become weapons on a school bus and many school districts that employ them have to have additional adults on each bus to insure kids buckle-up and don’t use the metal end to smack their neighbor. Cost and lawsuits go up dramatically when seatbelts are installed. This is a rare accident as most school buses chug from corner to corner like a city transit bus never getting over 35 mph. The “nanny state” approach fails the common sense test.
Dear Ralph,
I was very interested to read you comments on how school buses should be equipped with seat belts and I could not agree more. This is something I always have wondered about when I was in those school buses myself as a pupil: it seemed rather akward to have seat belts everywhere else but here, where you did not even know if the driver was a really good one.
However, I am not sure bikes would be the only transportation system not requiring any.
In my opinion, elevators would also come into that category… as you know they are the most reliable public transportation system in the world!
Best regards,
Delphine