Bus Accident
I am the bearer of both good and bad news. Let’s start with the bad.
Brook and Hugo were driving the bus up through Central America. They were about 3 hours from the boarder of the US and Mexico. At the time, Hugo was driving and Brook was asleep in back. Suddenly, two of the back tires “de-laminated,” meaning they sort of blew-up by stripping themselves. Hugo remembers swerving back and forth violently. The next thing he remembers is waking up in the hospital. Brook remembers waking up suspended in the air thinking, “whoa, this is sort of cool,” and then slamming into the roof of the bus. After that all he knows is that they made it to the hospital. Officials tell them that the bus was reported to have rolled over a total of 3 times before stopping.
Injuries:
- Hugo has a few scars on his face and some torn muscles in his arm. He should be okay with time.
- Brook has a concussion that is mostly better, his collar bone separated from his shoulder but should heal with time; he has a gash on his back, lots of bruising and a few other cuts. He should also be okay with time.
(The good news is that they are alive and will heal with time).
Why it Happened (this is the F@*CKED up part): The tires were almost brand-new, with the appropiate amount of air in the tires. Hugo and Brook were driving on a toll road in Mexico. For those of you who haven’t been, the toll roads in Mexico are often NICER than the roads in the US. When the accident happened, Hugo was on a flat and straight road that was very well paved. The tires blew out spontaneously, meaning that the tires were defective.
Remember a few years ago when those Ford Explorers that had to get recalled because the Firestone tires kept on blowing out? Well our tires on the bus were Bridgestone, which is a sub-company under Firestone. It looks like we had the same shitty luck that those thousands of Ford Explorers had. And as a result Hugo and Brook almost died, a $40,000 bus is wrecked and a bunch of expensive stuff is destroyed.
I suppose it is important to note that this defective tire theory has not yet been proven, but Hugo says the tire looks exactly like the photos in the reports of the tires that would de-laminate on the Explorers. I did a bit of research and Firestone/Bridgestone has a lot of tires that are tagged as defective. I don’t have the tire number (Hugo is working on getting it) it reference, but I am pretty positive that it was just a defective tire. Since the road was so perfect and all, I can’t think of anything else.
Other things you may be wondering:
- The Bus: They are planning on trying to sell as much of the bus as
they can to a junk yard. The engine is just great, the tranny is fine
and we’ll see about the rest. - Our processor: Totally shot.
- Tools and other valuable things on the bus: stolen.
- When are they coming home?
- Hugo should be back up at Whitman next Monday.
- Brook should be back in Ashland next week.
- Insurance: They did have liability insurance, but no wreckage insurance. As such, it looks like we are out $40,000 (unless we sue
Firestone). - Other people on the road: As far as I know, no other vehicles were
involved. Only Hugo and Brook got hurt.
The other question people have been asking me is, “Why wasn’t the rest of the crew on the bus?” The answer to that question is that Hugo has family in Mexico that he hadn’t seen in like 10 years, so he wanted to take some time after the project to visit his family. Brook wanted to take some time surfing and relaxing in Central America. The rest of us wanted to leave Central America right after the project because of various obligations back in the US, so we all bought plane tickets and went home earlier.
Peace,
Joseph