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Ever had an accident on a bus?

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As either a passenger or a driver, have you ever been on a bus involved in an accident?

In 20 years I had no blame worthy accidents on the road, quite proud of that record, a couple of minor scratches in the depot.

Once had a guy come round a bend on the wrong side of the road, overtaking a bunch of parked cars on his side, I managed to stop but he didn't and drove into me.

First thing he said was " you were going too fast" , yes mate, up hill with a full load in an ex London MCW with a top speed of 30mph. A couple of passengers were injured due to the emergency stop.

Never heard any more but I hope they threw the book at him.
 
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Qwerty133

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As a passenger twice. One of them was a very minor incident in which the bus clipped the wing mirror of a parked car and the bus was undamaged and continued on the journey within 5-10 minutes. The other saw the bus accelerate away from traffic lights into the side of a moving lorry which caused a smashed windscreen and other damage to the front of the bus. Whilst the lorry may have passed the lights on amber or red there was plenty it was pretty obvious what was happening and the driver really shouldn't have moved off from the lights so I'd say it was at least equally the fault of the bus.
 

yorkie

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As either a passenger or a driver, have you ever been on a bus involved in an accident?
I was on a bus which scraped the side of a stone wall and got stuck. It was just short of my destination and I had somewhere I needed to be, so I didn't hang around to see how it got freed.
 

306024

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Only once, on a rail replacement bus in Oban car park of all places. Quite minor though.

The skill of bus drivers, especially in dealing with cyclists who appear in both sides has my total respect.
 

alxndr

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I've been on a bus that reversed into the front of another bus whilst backing up down a road.
 
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Only once, on a rail replacement bus in Oban car park of all places. Quite minor though.

The skill of bus drivers, especially in dealing with cyclists who appear in both sides has my total respect.
There are so many cyclists on the road now I have no idea how drivers manage.

Another one that's just come back to me, pedestrian stepped out in front of me as I pulled away at a green light, bus knocked him over but he just got up and walked away. He was a well known street drinker and refused to speak to me, I had to report that one to the police as I was worried he was injured.
 

bussikuski179

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Several times actually, all quite minor though. First time was when a bus randomly swerved and struck a wall of a building, not too badly though. Second time was when a mirror of another bus bashed in a window of my bus and then just continued. Third time was just this January, when 2 electric buses collided and sustained small scrapes, because it was icy and these new buses were 15m when most tri-axles here are only 14,5, so the driver turned too late somehow and hit the other. All of these were in winter as well, hardly surprising as Finnish winter can be quite harsh.
 

90sWereBetter

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Two minor reversing incidents, one on Castle Meadow in Norwich where our bus got blocked in by others, the driver impatiently put the bus in reverse to get a better angle to clear the offending vehicle...straight into a wooden marker post which ripped off the bumper and a light cluster. Ooops.

The other was in Lowestoft bus station, a case of reversing out of the bay straight into an incoming service...
 

Baxenden Bank

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As a passenger, a number of minor incidents that I can think of quickly:
  • Car failed to stop coming out of a side street and hit bus, felt/sounded like hitting a large pot hole to be honest, gave my details to bus driver (as a witness) and made a statement by post when requested later. The thing was the car driver disappeared and we thought he would never be seen again (I think he said he needed to go home for his phone), but he did come back.
  • Sat on a bus at traffic lights and watched a (Stobart) lorry coming the opposite way crunch into the limited clearance rail bridge we were waiting at. Took half a day to extract it. Lorry driver arrested for drink driving, never saw the outcome in the papers.
  • Travelling on a Ribble X60 service and went (in passenger service) through Frenchwood Garage in Preston. Loud scraping noise as the bus was higher than the base of the roof girders. Bus drafted in for weekend extra so bus and driver probably not normally on that route / from that garage.
  • Bus and car in narrow road, car mirror hit as bus turned into street but no damage, quick chat to check, on our way.
  • Many years ago watched a bus glide slowly, gracefully but uncontrollably (on not much snow/ice) into the back of another bus. Created a V-shaped dent in the rear of the bus. WM Travel in Birmingham City Centre.
 

Gloster

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In the mid-1970s I was on a Hants & Dorset Bristol single-decker (RE or similar) when then driver was manoeuvring the bus around a very badly parked van. The van driver decided to move his vehicle and managed to ram it backwards into the bus’s wheel-arch sufficiently hard for the bus driver to decide that he wasn’t driving it any further. He had to go into a house and ring the depot for a replacement vehicle to be sent out.
 

domcoop7

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Not personally, but I represented (as a lawyer) a passenger on a bus that crashed into a garden wall a few years back, when the driver had a blackout. Fortunately there was no long-term serious injury to driver or any passengers on board though!
 

CN04NRJ

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In 12 years of driving i've had 2 very minor at faults and a few not at faults.

I've had an old lady assume that I was at a bus stop once and started overtaking me into oncoming traffic (I was just sat in traffic) - she scraped down the entire length of the rear half of my bendy bus to avoid hitting oncoming traffic then tried to carry on driving. I got out to exchange details, she refused and started trying to physically push me out of the way with her car by driving into my legs. I obviously moved out of the way, she drove off down a narrow side street (the wrong way) and met a truck head on. With nowhere to go, she had to exchange details then.

Out of the others the strangest was driving out of Cardiff City Centre westbound in a Mercedes Citaro, approaching a set of traffic lights with a longer queue for the right hand lane (to turn right) than the left hand lane I was going straight on in. As i'm approaching the back of the right hand queue this VW Transporter comes absolutely hounding down the right hand lane, at the time I assumed he was just trying to beat the traffic but I didn't have time to slow down enough and he ended up smashing into the back of the car in the right hand lane and taking out my cab window and nearside front bumper. Fair amount of damage.

Initially he refused to give any details, ended up in a little bit of an argument as he was incredibly frustrated - obviously got straight onto control who said the police were on their way. He then said he was police but couldn't say anything else and got back in his van. Shortly after (as we were near the main police station in the centre) a high ranking policeman turned up in a Toyota Land Cruiser (think this is the chie's, or whatever they're called's car) and dealt with the situation on behalf of him. Still to this day I didn't get to know any details, but assume he was some kind of deep undercover officer on a job.
 

Ostrich

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I think the worst one I've experienced was at the Ivy Bush traffic light complex on the Hagley Road in Birmingham. I was City-bound on a WMPTE double-decker and when the lights turned green, there was the usual Le Mans racing start with 4 lanes of traffic heading towards Five Ways. At which point a police car, lights flashing and horn blaring shot out of Chad Road against a red light and headed right across everyone's bows. Cue (and kudos to our driver for what must have been a lightning-fast reaction) the Mother of all emergency stops. Thankfully nobody hit anything, but the trouble was the City-bound bus stops are just the other side of the lights, people were starting to get off their seats, and quite a few folk went flying. One elderly lady in particular was thrown off her feet and collected quite a wallop. The bus journey was terminated whilst they summoned an ambulance, thankfully plenty of other buses were around so passengers were quickly transferred.
 

Busaholic

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All in London, one actual and two narrowly avoided. The actual one was the bus I was on driving into a skip at the side of the road in broad daylight and fine weather conditions: bus virtually empty, I was at front of bus upstairs and braced myself, so didn't get injured. One of the nearlies was the bus I'd just got off had its front offside upper window smashed at the next set of traffic lights, and I'd been sitting in that front seat: the second was waiting for my bus to school one morning, and it didn't turn up. Turned out the driver had had a fatal heart attack about four stops previously and had ploughed through a garden fence, but with no injuries to the few passengers, or conductor.
 

Darandio

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Unfortunately yes, and a major one at that. I've never spoken about it before but it's around 27-28 years ago now.

I was 12-13 at the time and we had boarded the school bus as usual before the queue of buses started to leave the car park and join the main road. A girl in the year above mine had been late leaving class and was running alongside our bus apparently trying to bang on the side, as we swung around on to the main road she unfortunately slipped and went under. She died later in hospital.

I can't really remember much about what I was doing as it happened, I didn't hear the banging and I was sat on the other side of the bus. People also said they shouted at the driver to stop before the accident occured, I cannot remember hearing it. All I remember were screams at the driver in the immediate aftermath and him opening the door and jumping off. Over the next week or so all people on the bus were visited at home by the police to give a statement.

So young, tragic.
 

Mcr Warrior

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As either a passenger or a driver, have you ever been on a bus involved in an accident?
Thought that this thread was going to be all about "Where there's blame there's a claim" ambulance chasing legal firms for a moment.

Nearest I've been was on an old T68 Metrolink tram inching "wrong line" (due to city centre engineering works) into the original layout St Peter's Square tram station, before scraping all along the side of a service bus that had been held at a set of red traffic lights but had stopped awkwardly in such a way that it was partly overhanging the curving "keep clear" marked area swept by trams.

No one was injured thankfully, due to the low collision speed, but an awful lot of touch up paint would certainly have been required to cover up the impromptu "go faster" stripes on both vehicles.
 

Bertie the bus

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Back in probably the early 80’s I was on a double decker that hit an Invacar that had run a red light. I don’t recall what happened to the occupant, though just being a schoolboy at the time I think we were quickly ushered away, but his car disintegrated. As they were so flimsy I don’t think us bus passengers even felt the impact.
 

richw

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Once, I had handbrake on, van hit the side of my bus. Van failed to stop. Cctv showed I was stationary and handbrake on and was the end of the matter for me with employer. Had to go through hit and run report with police, never heard any more from them.

but assume he was some kind of deep undercover officer on a job.
MI5 even!
 

route101

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Nothing major.
Minor smash with car on a school kid.
Few emergency stops, very sore and you are pushed into seat at front. Last one was on a E200MMC, cyclist went straight across in front of the bus. The bus stopped in time but just hit the cyclist lightly. Few passengers went flying. The cyclist did a runner.

Had a Trident get stuck on a side of house, in the guttering.

Do feel a bit unnerved on a double decker going quite fast on a country road, what it topples? Must be sore if that happens. I have been on two smaller Mellars and Stratas where the driver was pretty much flat on the B roads. do they really have to drive that fast.

Anyone been on a double decker that's toppled?
 

Roilshead

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Early 1990's, sometime just after 7pm on a November week-night, lower end Gibbet Street, leaving Halifax on a 522(?) to Norton Tower, sat on nearside above rear wheelarch, a couple of other passengers aboard from what I recall - BANG! . . . brick through second off-side window, straight into side of face of female passenger. She fell across the seat, holding the side of her face - she was lucky she didn't lose her right eye, it was a right mess . . . lots of blood, her ear badly-torn, and you could see (smashed) teeth through a laceration in her cheek. I'm not good with that sort-of-thing, so I folded my scarf as a sort of compress over the side her face whilst talking to her etc . . . driver radioed for ambulance as we drove on, before parking up back in civilisation. I think some time after Yorkshire Rider abandoned the lower half of Gibbet Street after 6pm as being too dangerous. I have never felt entirely comfortable since on a lit bus after dark (not that any in service buses tend to drive around un-lit), and I always take my chances upstairs even if I've come off a late train and have my wheelie-case with me.
 

Strathclyder

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Not on a bus, but was very, very nearly struck (literally a few inches removed from death or serious/life threatening injury) by one (a Dash-bodied Volvo B6, if memory serves) running a red light at a zebra crossing (just to be clear, I had the right of way) one winter's evening about 13-14 years ago. With not a shred of hyperbole, if it weren't for my mum pushing/pulling me clear (can't remember which it was now) with a literal second to spare, I wouldn't be here typing this. It was a case of looking one way as I was crossing, then turning to find a B6 quickly bearing down on me and showing no signs of attempting to stop. Was left teary-eyed and shaking in my mother's arms. Should note here that the driver didn't stop after charging through the crossing, coming inches away from smearing me across the tarmac in the process. A passing couple managed to catch the buses' registration and the police later came to my house to take a statement and some details. Never heard back from them, but the company (DB Travel I believe) running the B6 ceased operating the route it'd been used on (competing with First Glasgow's 62 on my local bus corridor) a few months later. It's a wonder I wasn't put off bus travel for life.

As a haunting bookend, the crossing where I was nearly killed was less than 150 yards away (on the same stretch of road) from the spot where a few years prior, a schoolboy of a similar age to me that night was fatally struck by a First Glasgow double decker (memory is pretty hazy here, but I seem to remember it was one of the oddball tri-axle Nordic-bodied B7Ls that was involved) as he crossed the road without using the zebra crossing. You can call such a act many things, but there's no getting away from the fact that it ended with a dead child, a shattered family and a traumatized driver. Had circumstances been ever so slightly different on the night of my near-miss, the same harrowing ritual would've been repeated.
 
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CN04NRJ

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MI5 even!

It was very bizarre so entirely possible, some plain clothes person dealt with me and and the company supervisor. I got the impression it was more drugs related but one of the more interesting things to happen to me.

I'm sure us bus drivers with alot of time in the industry could write books on the weird and wonderful things we've experienced!
 

lxfe_mxtterz

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Had my first one just the other day (well, sort of!) I was on a bus which took a turn down a closed road, and as such we had to spend the next 20 minutes trying to turn around on a horrendously narrow road boxed in by "road closed" signs on one side. During the manoeuvre, we managed to hit a traffic cone - nothing major but the driver did have to get out to check the bus was okay (and move the cone!)
 

cnjb8

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When I was at school, I was on the school bus and the rear clipped a car but just kept driving. When I tried to notify the driver he didn't say anything back!
 

Busaholic

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Unfortunately yes, and a major one at that. I've never spoken about it before but it's around 27-28 years ago now.

I was 12-13 at the time and we had boarded the school bus as usual before the queue of buses started to leave the car park and join the main road. A girl in the year above mine had been late leaving class and was running alongside our bus apparently trying to bang on the side, as we swung around on to the main road she unfortunately slipped and went under. She died later in hospital.

I can't really remember much about what I was doing as it happened, I didn't hear the banging and I was sat on the other side of the bus. People also said they shouted at the driver to stop before the accident occured, I cannot remember hearing it. All I remember were screams at the driver in the immediate aftermath and him opening the door and jumping off. Over the next week or so all people on the bus were visited at home by the police to give a statement.

So young, tragic.
You wouldn't forget such an event. I saw the aftermath of a similar accident a dozen or so years ago when staying at my sister's place. It was made far worse by the fact that it was witnessed by the girl's mother from the car stuck in traffic that the teenager had just jumped out of. The physically uninjured driver was receiving attention from the London Ambulance Service as well, and we shouldn't discount the impact such occurrences can have on bus drivers, not just train drivers.
 

elbows47

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It must have been in about 1954 or 1955 I was on an RT in Plumstead, London, stationary at a bus stop when another RT came up behind and parked in the same piece of road. My mother and I had to leave the bus through the damaged platform and as I looked around it I noticed it was different to normal (I was only 7). Many years later I saw the platform area of a pre war RT (the turnover bus at Stonebridge) and realised it was the same layout. The odd thing was that the garage that operated the bus I was on didn't have any pre-war RTs so it must have been a loan. The red ones were all withdrawn during 1955.
 

hexagon789

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Once on a bus which was brake tested by a car switching lanes last minute right in front of the bus. A bit of a prang to the car's door but nothing serious.
 

Busaholic

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It must have been in about 1954 or 1955 I was on an RT in Plumstead, London, stationary at a bus stop when another RT came up behind and parked in the same piece of road. My mother and I had to leave the bus through the damaged platform and as I looked around it I noticed it was different to normal (I was only 7). Many years later I saw the platform area of a pre war RT (the turnover bus at Stonebridge) and realised it was the same layout. The odd thing was that the garage that operated the bus I was on didn't have any pre-war RTs so it must have been a loan. The red ones were all withdrawn during 1955.
It wasn't a New Cross garage bus then?
 

Polarbear

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A few, but thankfully all minor, (well, one major but no injuries).

  • Bus going to Crewe bus station tried avoiding an awkwardly parked van, that was parked just before the sharp left hand turn coming in from Market St to Delamere St. Misjudged the bend vs length of bus & became firmly wedged against the railings.
  • An Arriva bus in Stafford sideswiped a stone wall, the driver again having misjudged the turning circle of the vehicle.
  • A National Express coach heading into London. Two lanes filtered into one & it was a toss up between the mini in the left lane, and the plaxton tiger in the right lane. Neither would give way & it was eventually decided by the coach ripping off the wing mirror of the mini, side swiping it, & bowling on like nothing had happened! This was a good many years ago mind, when things were maybe just a bit less professional on NX.
  • A bus caught fire one day when I was travelling into Chester (rear brakes had not released properly & the driver kept going). Everyone was evacuated from the vehicle with smoke billowing from the back of it. I don't think it ever came back into service.
 

philthetube

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When driving in London I put in 13 accident reports in 5 years, none of which were my fault these included:-

A passenger injured when I made an emergency stop after a cyclist rode straight out of a side road.
2 occasions when I had stones thrown through windows
2 occasions when my bus was parked in a station and I was not even on it
2 occasions when cars drove into the back of the bus when loading passengers
1 when a car came past me and immediately tried to turn left about a foot in front of me.
1 when a passenger cut his finger on a sharp edge on a sear back
1 when a 3 year old child fell down stairs, (really dont think they should be coming down stairs on a moving bus.
1 serious one when a stolen car hit a bollard in the middle of the road, lost control hit two other cars and then ended up embedded in the front of my bus.

I can't remember what the other 2 were but all theis was over 25 years ago

I was on Sicily once when the bus was involved in a minor accident with a car, police had to be called and every passenger had ID/passports checked, big hoo-ha for little scratch
 
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