At least one person has been killed and dozens wounded after a tour bus collided with a broken-down SUV in Los Angeles.
Police were called to the scene in Hacienda Heights just after 5 a. m. local time to find a sports utility vehicle in flames and a bus with significant front-end damage and a shattered windshield.
Emergency workers were unable to save the driver of the Nissan Pathfinder SUV, who had become trapped in the vehicle. Two people riding the bus were critically injured while an additional 30 were taken to hospital, according to local law enforcement. Another 31 passengers onboard the bus, that was reportedly headed to Koreatown after a casino trip in the Coachella Valley, were unharmed.
Preliminary investigations suggest the SUV had broken down on the road when the tour bus collided into the back of the vehicle, causing it to veer into the highway before smashing into the guardrail on the other side of the road.
A passenger on the bus, Joe Runnel, told KTLA-TV that people were “begging for mercy” in the moments after the crash that closed two lanes of State Route 60 for several hours.
“I was thrown from the back seat of the bus to the floor about three or four seats down,” Runnel said. “Glass was on me … there was a lot of hollering.”
An eyewitness who was driving on State Route 60 at the time of the crash said the situation unfolded so quickly that many of those behind the bus struggled to stop.
“It happened so quickly…a lot of chaos and then just red lights,” the eyewitness told local media. “It’s going to be very [catastrophic], especially because it’s Mother’s Day … it’s very sad that it had to start like this.”
Officials said the bus was headed from the Indio area of the desert near Palm Springs to the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles. Police originally said the bus was coming from Morongo. The highway was fully reopened by late morning.
The driver of the Nissan has yet to be named and investigations into the cause are ongoing.
"Our officers who are conducting the investigation did speak with the passengers, obtaining statements and gathering information to try to ascertain what exactly took place prior to and leading up to this collision," CHP Officer Zachary Salazar told NBC4 Los Angeles.
