The West Virginia Governor’s Highway Safety Program (GHSP) is teaming up with the U.S. Dept. of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to urge drivers to slow down and be aware of school buses in their communities.
Although school buses are one of the safest modes of transportation, injuries and fatalities do occur outside of or near the buses. Most often, these tragedies occur because a motorist has failed to slow down and obey the bus’s stop sign or failed to follow local traffic laws.
Nationally, school bus passing is illegal, and it is a deadly risk to bus riders and their caregivers. Drivers should always come to a complete stop when a school bus stop-arm is extended, and the red lights are flashing.              
From 2014-23, there were 171 pedestrians killed in school-bus-related traffic crashes. A total of 79 school-age children (18 and younger) died outside the bus.
From 2000-23, there were 61 fatalities in crashes that involved a driver illegally passing a stopped school bus, an average of 2.5 fatalities a year. Almost half of those fatalities were pedestrians who were 18 years old or younger.
“When a school bus’s red lights are flashing and the stop-arm is extended, drivers have a legal responsibility to slow down and come to a complete stop,” said GHSP director Jack McNeely.
“This is not a suggestion — it’s the law. In fact, yellow flashing lights indicate the bus is preparing to stop to load or unload children,” he said.
“This is when motorists should begin to slow down and prepare to stop their vehicles. Motorists may begin moving only when the red flashing lights are turned off, the stop-arm is withdrawn, and the bus begins to move,” McNeeley said. “School bus riders and their caretakers are relying on drivers to follow the law to keep them safe.”
The school bus loading and unloading area is called the “Danger Zone” and includes any side of the bus where the bus driver can’t see the child and, therefore, the child is in the most danger.
Those areas include:
*10 feet in front of the bus, where the driver may be sitting too high to see a child.
*10 feet on either side of the bus, where a child may be in the driver’s blind spots.
*Behind the school bus.