PAUL — Two adults and four children were injured Monday morning when two school buses collided on Highway 25 near Paul, Idaho State Police said.
A school bus rear-ended another as it was picking up kids on the rural highway, according to The Associated Press. The second bus was traveling “at a considerable amount of speed” at about 7:15 a.m., Idaho State Police Sgt. Benjamin Foster told the AP, and the sun wasn’t yet up. “It was in that twilight-dawn period,” he said.
Both adults and one of the children were airlifted via emergency helicopters to medical centers, while the other three children were transported to nearby hospitals by ground ambulances and private vehicle, authorities said.
The names and conditions of the injured have not been released.
The crash involving the two Minidoka County School District buses occurred on westbound Highway 25 just outside of Paul, a city of about 1,800 people located north of Burley.
Seventeen students were on the buses at the time of the crash, state police said. A few kids waiting to get on the bus escaped unharmed, according to the AP.
The adult drivers of the buses were both injured, with one having to be extricated from the wreckage by emergency responders, state police said.
Authorities initially said the students’ injuries were non-life threatening. The three students who were treated at a nearby hospital all appeared to have non-life-threatening injuries like broken noses, Foster told the AP.
In a later news release state police said one of the students had been airlifted to a hospital in Utah and there would be no updates on the condition of any of the students injured in the crash due to the fact they are juveniles.
Authorities said that all of the students who did not suffer injuries in the crash have been reunited with their parents or guardians.
Questions about the students involved in the crash should be directed to the Minidoka County School District, state police said.
A photo from the crash released by state police showed a damaged bus on the side of the road, its front crumpled in an engine compartment exposed, with a few red warning lights still illuminated, the AP reported.
The Minidoka County School District wrote on Facebook that the district is “cooperating fully with authorities as the incident is reviewed.”
“Student safety is always our top priority,” the district wrote, according to the AP.
Highway 25 was closed for several hours because of the collision.
The accident remains under investigation by state police.