LONDON — A double-decker bus carrying high school students plunged into a river in southern England on Thursday, sending the driver and four teens to the hospital and leaving more than a dozen others with minor injures, officials said.
The bus was bound for Barton Peveril Sixth Form College, a school for 16- to 18-year-olds, when it went off a road in Eastleigh and plunged into the River Itchen. The cause of the crash was being investigated by police and the bus company.
“It must have been terrifying,” said Inspector Andy Tester of the Hampshire Constabulary.
All 19 passengers on board were either able to get off the bus or were rescued, police said. The bus driver and one student had serious injuries but were expected to survive.
Police said there was no indication as to why the bus veered off the road. But a woman who said she heard a screeching sound and saw the crash said the driver told her he couldn’t stop.
“I heard some noise, I looked out of the window and he just came careening into the river,” Kelly West said. “It felt very fast and obviously he just went straight through the barriers and into the river.”
West rushed to the scene and found the driver trapped and panicking. She reassured him that help was on the way.
“He said the brakes failed and the accelerator was jammed and that he was trying to avoid cars,” West said.
The bus was sitting upright in the river, next to a bridge, water up to its axels. Its front windows were smashed and mud was splattered on its side. A large section of bridge railing was missing.
West said she helped some of the shaken students get off the bus and to her garden.
About 14 students were treated at the scene by paramedics, the South Central Ambulance Service said. Two helicopters, five ambulances and fire crews responded to the crash.
The Bluestar Bus said it did not immediately know the circumstances of the crash.
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