It’s KWQC in Calamus, Iowa. After a scary event involving their 9-year-old son, a family in Calamus is asking drivers to pay more attention to school bus safety.
Noah James-Schonlan was hit by a car on Monday morning as he crossed Highway 30 to get to his school bus. The accident happened because a 15-year-old driver didn’t stop for the bus, which had its lights on.
“The car wasn’t there.” I was just doing my own thing while it came and went. Noah said, “The bus stopped with the stop sign out, and I just walked across. The car hit me over the windshield.”
Noah’s mother showed the police record, which says the driver was going west on Highway 30 and did not stop for the bus, which was going east.
Because Noah had hurt his head, back, shoulder, and leg, he was flown to the University of Iowa to get care. Luckily, his injuries did not put his life in danger.
“I only need people to listen.” Thank God, my son is safe and sound. “That could not have happened, and it’s very bad that that big school bus with flashing lights and the stop sign upside down was missed. We could have lost him,” Noah’s mother, Mickala James, said.
He was lucky not to be seriously hurt, but the experience will stay with him forever.
“He laughs and smiles one minute and hit me the next. Why did she have to do that?” Why did she keep going? When he’s sleeping and is suddenly woken up. “I can only guess what those memories are like for him, and it will take a long time,” Mickala James said.
She now wants changes to be made to how school buses work, especially the ones that pick up kids along busy roads. She wants buses to pick up kids from safer places, like driveways, so that this doesn’t happen again.
“The school bus driver is about to start pulling into our driveway.” Mike James said, “Noah will never walk on that highway again.”
“The school bus is still stopping on the highway.” I’d also like that to be changed. Big or small, I don’t think it made a difference if a big school bus wasn’t seen.
The 15-year-old driver was negligent when he or she illegally went around a stopped school bus whose lights were on. At this point, though, no new claims have been brought.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the U.S. Department of Transportation says that from 2000 to 2021, 53 people died in accidents where a driver illegally passed a stopped school bus. That’s an average of 2.4 deaths per year.