On March 24, 2021, NASDPTS sent a letter to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) responding to outstanding safety recommendations.  NASDPTS addressed all remaining safety recommendations from the following accidents:

  • “Motorcoach Collision With the Alexandria Avenue Bridge Overpass, George Washington Memorial Parkway, Alexandria, Virginia, November 14, 2004” (H-06-29)
  • “School Bus and Truck Collision at Intersection Near Chesterfield, New Jersey, February 16, 2012” (H-13-035)
  • “School Bus Run-Off-Road and Fire, Oakland, Iowa, December 12, 2017” (H-19-010)
  • “Vehicle Collison With Student Pedestrians Crossing High-Speed Roadway to Board School Bus, Rochester, Indiana, October 30, 2018” (H-20-015, H-20-016, H-20-017, and H-20-018)

NASDPTS has a long history of reviewing NTSB’s accident investigations and studies and acting on recommendations relating to school bus and student transportation safety.  Student transportation professionals and the parents and students we serve well understand the importance of maintaining the unparalleled, high level of safety provided by school bus transportation.  NASDPTS, its members, and all of the over one-half million professionals charged with driving, maintaining, and overseeing the nation’s school buses welcome and encourage any opportunity to further improve that record.

In your role as state director of pupil transportation, please review the NASDPTS letter of response.  The letter contains a number of useful links to the NTSB reports of each the accidents referenced above.  We strongly encourage you to review the reports and safety recommendations, as well as the NASDPTS responses to each recommendation.  Please encourage school districts, contractors, and other safety partners in your state to do the same.  To the extent practical, we hope you will consider working with policy makers and others to implement all of the NTSB and NASDPTS recommended actions that are not already in place within your state.

If you already have relevant regulations, procedures, and best practices, we are interested in hearing about them and will consider placing them on our website for the benefit of others.  We have updated the association’s website (www.nasdpts.org) to include the NTSB reports, the NASDPTS responses, and related information.  From our home page go to Resources…NTSB Reports and Recommendations.

Please let us know if you have questions or comments as you review the documents.  We can be reached at [email protected] or (703) 203-6485.