WV school bus carrying 41 careens off road, injuring several students

Police now know how a school bus carrying 38 students crashed into a tree on Thursday evening.

West Virginia State Police said the bus was transporting 38 student athletes and 3 coaches. They were on their way from Buckeye Local High School in Rayland, Ohio, to West Liberty University in West Virginia to watch a football practice, the Associated Press reported.

The school bus then went off of the road into a ditch, and the rear of the bus slammed into a tree alongside the road, state police said in a statement.

“The driver was unfamiliar with the winding roadway, and the driver was traveling too fast for the condition of the roadway,” West Virginia State Police Senior Trooper K. M. Parker said in a statement.

State police added that the 22 students taken to nearby hospitals did not have life-threatening injuries. One person on the bus was taken to the ICU for multiple fractures, The Intelligencer reported, adding that several bus windows were broken. The other 16 students were treated at the scene of the crash, state police said. One of the coaches was also taken to the hospital, according to the police statement.

The Intelligencer said many of the students' parents arrived at the scene of the crash, and that another bus came soon after the crash to transport the uninjured students.

The driver, Donald L. Haggerty, did get a citation for "Driving too fast for Conditions,” according to the statement.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.