A school bus with eight elementary school students aboard was involved in a five-vehicle accident on icy roads Thursday morning in Kingfield, police said.
No children on the bus were injured, and they were taken by a second bus to Kingfield Elementary School. Two of the drivers involved were taken to hospitals.
It had started to rain hard in the area about 20 minutes before the 7:40 a.m. accident, leaving the roads icy, police said.
A 2007 Toyota Avalon driven by Judi Hawkes, 55, of Cumberland, was traveling west on Route 142, and the school bus, driven by Debra Johnson, 62, of Kingfield, was traveling east. As the vehicles approached each other, Hawkes lost control on the ice. Her car bounced off a snowbank and into the front of the school bus.
A vehicle driven by Erica Bracy, 39, of Freeman Township, had been following the bus and stopped in time.
But a vehicle driven by Brian Leblanc, 32, of Salem, struck Bracy’s vehicle from behind, slamming it into the rear of the school bus. Another driver went off the road to avoid the pileup, police said.
Hawkes was injured and had to be extricated from her vehicle.
Bracy also was injured but walked to an ambulance, police said. Both were taken to local hospitals.
The Franklin County Sheriff’s Office was dispatched along with first responders, according to a news release from the sheriff’s office.
About 7:50 a.m., authorities received a report of a second crash less than 500 yards west of the school bus accident. Police found a 2001 Ford Focus upside down on top of a snowbank.
The driver, Hanna Snider, 20, of Sorrento, had been traveling east and lost control of her car as she approached several vehicles that had stopped because of the school bus crash. No injuries were reported in that accident.
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