A police investigation has begun on what may have caused a crash between a school bus carrying 12 children and a dumpster killing an 11-year-old boy on an idle Idaho road on Thursday, according to the Associated Press.
The school bus was carrying 12 kids, plus the driver, to Crimson Point Elementary School when it collided with a dump truck on a two-lane road between small farms about 20 miles from the city of Boise, the AP reported.
Four other children were injured and taken to a hospital; two were released, but the other two needed further special care, according to the AP. The bus driver and truck driver were uninjured.
Daniel Robert Cook died of blunt force trauma on Thursday shortly after the collision, Canyon County Coroner Vicki DeGeus-Morris told the AP.
Idaho State Police are investigating what happened and who might be at fault due to the fatality of the child.
"it's not just an infraction," Master Cpl. Timothy Davidson told the AP. "It's going to be a criminal charge, more than likely."
The dump truck driver, 33-year-old Charles Derby from Nampa, Idaho, ran to the school bus after impact to help the children on board, according to state police, UPI.com reported.
"He knew there were kids hurt," Davidson said. "He saw the nitty-gritty, if you will, of the crash scene and the damage that had been done, up to and including the deceased boy."
According to state police spokeswoman Teresa Backer, a nurse who passed the bus right before the collision turned back after the crash and performed CPR on Cook, but he died at the scene UPI.com reported.
Authorities have already performed acceleration tests in order to recreate the scene on the road, which has a speed limit of 50 mph, but Idaho Police Sergeant John Burke said a final assessment may take weeks, according to the AP.
"We can't really speculate," he said. "We need to gather more information and continue the investigation."
After routine inspections of both the bus and the truck, police found no maintenance issues with the school bus, but found numerous equipment violations on the truck, which the driver, Derby, owned, the AP reported. Officials are not sure if any of the violations played a role in the accident.
