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UVic making changes in wake of fatal Bamfield road bus crash

Changes after fatal crash

Any future student field trips to Bamfield on the west coast of Vancouver Island will only travel and arrive during daylight, in the wake of a bus crash that killed two students in September, the University of Victoria announced Thursday.

The university said field trips will also have pre-determined itineraries, an additional satellite communications device will be used, there will be first aid equipment appropriate to the group size, and staff will be on board who can enforce protocols such as adhering to the itinerary and wearing of seatbelts.

A Wilson’s Transportation coach carrying 45 first-year University of Victoria students and two teaching assistants en route to a first-year biology field trip at Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre crashed on Sept. 13 on Bamfield Main, a gravel logging road that links Port Alberni and Bamfield.

Emma MacIntosh Machado, 18, of Winnipeg, and John Geerdes, 18, from Iowa City, Iowa, died in the crash. Many other students were injured.

The changes announced by the university come after witness accounts that the bus left on the field trip later than planned, the bus was travelling in the dark, although the itinerary said the driver wanted to arrive before dark, the satellite communications phone was not working properly, there was not enough first-aid equipment for all of the students, and most of the students did not wear their seatbelts, something witnesses say they were never instructed to do.

The university said the bus was mid-way from Port Alberni to Bamfield when it moved closer to the side of the gravel logging road as a vehicle approached from the opposite direction at a point where the road narrows.

The bus tipped off the side of the road, slid on its side down an incline and onto its roof, said the university. Emergency responders attended and the students were transported to Port Alberni and Duncan for treatment. Most of the students arrived back at UVic the following day.

Afterwards, the university hired independent expert Ross Cloutier to review its planning and operations prior to the crash, as well as its response.

Cloutier, an expert in outdoor-related risk management with Kamloops-based Bhudak Consultants Ltd., reviewed university policies, pre-trip information and planning processes. He interviewed students, parents and university employees, and visited the accident site and the Bamfield facility, said the university.

All surviving students and their parents or guardians were provided the opportunity to speak or correspond with Cloutier, who also travelled to Manitoba and Iowa to meet with the families of the deceased students, said the university.

“This was a harrowing event that presented complex challenges and those interviews and conversations would have been difficult,” said UVic president Jamie Cassels in a statement.

“We fully accept the review’s recommendations and are already working diligently to implement them to help prevent an accident like this from ever happening again, to strengthen planning for student trips off campus and to allow us to more effectively respond to critical incidents.”

The university, along with the Huu-ay-aht First Nations, the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre and others, also plan to advocate to the B.C. government for road improvements, something parents of the students have identified as an important priority, said the university. One survivor of the crash started a petition after the crash for road improvements. The condition and suitability of the logging road as an essential corridor between Bamfield and Port Alberni continues to be a concern, said the university.

The university said it will work with the marine sciences centre, which is co-owned by five western Canadian universities, to explore ideas that would benefit users of the road, such as a pilot-car service, an information hub for travellers with road and other information, and the use of VHF radio for vehicle-to-vehicle communications.

The marine centre is not booking school field trips until at least April 2021 due to COVID-19 health and safety considerations.

UVic said it will not use buses for field trips to the centre until the pertinent recommendations are in place. The university also said it agrees with the review that using the MV Frances Barkley ferry service from Port Alberni to Bamfield might be useful for some field schools.

The review also looked at the university’s response to the accident, recommending changes to incident-response decision-making, development of an emergency-response procedure for off-campus incidents, further co-ordination of student-service supports, and operational guidelines for the level, volume and complexity of resources to respond to incidents of this scale in the immediate aftermath and for months afterward.

“We know this devastating accident has caused immeasurable grief and that the impacts are ongoing for the families of the students who died, and for the other students on the bus and their families,” Cassels said.

“To those who have suffered loss and hardship, the university is profoundly sorry.”



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