School Bus Crash Probe Finds No Proof That Truck Brakes Failed

ALTON, Tex. —  Federal investigators found no evidence to support a truck driver’s contention that his brakes failed before the vehicle rammed a school bus into a water-filled pit, killing 20 teen-agers, an official said Friday.

“From a visual inspection, we can find nothing to indicate a failure in the braking system,” said Lee Dickinson, a National Transportation Safety Board member. He said investigators would conduct other tests.

The 10-member NTSB team of investigators planned to interview truck driver Ruben Perez and his assistant, who also was in the truck when it hit the bus Thursday.

Perez told Texas Department of Public Safety troopers that the brakes failed on the truck, causing him to go into the intersection and hit the bus.

The bus, carrying 86 passengers, careened into the 40-foot pit owned by the city of Alton.

The toll from the accident rose to 20 Friday with the death of Yesenia Perez, 15. She suffered cardiac arrest, officials said.

At least 63 people were injured when the bus tumbled into the pit. One student and the bus driver, Gilberto Pena, 46, remained in critical but stable condition; another student was still unconscious at Mission General Hospital.

Truck driver Perez, 25, was treated at Mission General and released Friday.

At the site of the accident, a wreath of blue and white flowers shook in the wind as streams of motorists drove by, some stopping to mourn.

“You can only do so much,” said firefighter Raul Garcia, looking into the pit where the day before he had helped rescue dozens of students and recover the bodies of others trapped in the submerged bus.

He and a few other men had propped up the 4-foot wreath of carnations at the edge of the pit. “On behalf of the Alton Volunteer Fire Department,” its banner read.

In the small south Texas towns of Alton and Mission, many drove with their headlights on as a sign of mourning.

More than 10,000 people filled the Tom Landry Stadium at Mission High School on Friday night to honor the bus accident victims.

“The emptiness that we feel will not be replaced again,” said Sanjuanita Zamora, Alton’s mayor. “A part of our lives has been taken away from us.”

Earlier Friday, about 500 people crowded into tiny San Martin de Porres Catholic Church for the first of the funerals, that of 12-year-old Elda Patricia Cruz.

“It doesn’t help to say why him or why her. Only God knows,” Father Frank Gomez said in the service given in Spanish and English.

Alton, which is about 15 miles from the Mexico border, is part of the Mission school district. Classes were canceled Friday.

“It’s very quiet here,” said Dina Chapa, Mission High School assistant principal. “What we’re doing right now is collecting the (victims’) personal belongings from lockers and giving out information, finding out when the funerals are for the students,” Chapa said.

Police said Friday that 86 people were on the bus, rather than 81 as previously reported. Sgt. Israel Pacheco said several students who escaped the bus with minor injuries walked away from the accident and were not immediately counted.

The bus was designed to carry 83 people, according to the manufacturer. Texas law sets no capacity limit but says one student can be standing for each seat in a bus.