Fatal bus crash inquiry hears of complaints about driver
Posted Mar 30, 2010 5:25 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A Calgary fatality inquiry has heard that students on a Third Academy school bus often had to yell at bus driver Louise Rogers to get her to pay attention to the road.
One student also testified that she told a teacher and counsellor at the school that Rogers was on her cellphone all the time while driving.
Rogers was behind the wheel of a bus in October 2007 when it slammed into a broken down gravel truck on Crowchild Trail, killing 9 year-old Kathelynn Occena.
Earlier, another student’s mother testified she complained about Rogers a number of times, prior to the crash.
A Winnipeg-based RCMP toxicologist also talked about the drugs in Louise Rogers system, saying they should not have hurt her ability to drive the school bus that October morning in 2007.
The officer found several drugs in the driver’s blood sample, including a sleep aid, an antihistamine and an anti-depressant.
The inquiry will not lay any blame for the accident, but make recommendations on how to prevent this type of tragedy in the future.
