Report: Bus driver passed out before crash

AUSTIN, MINN. - On the bus headed home from an Iowa casino, Bill Kesler found out how lucky he really is.

Out for a day trip with family, the Rochester man walked away from a horrific crash that killed two Wednesday afternoon on Interstate 90. The eastbound tour bus, carrying people mostly in their 70s, shot across the median, careened through the westbound lanes of late afternoon traffic and ended up on its side in a ditch.

Two bus passengers were killed, and the 21 others aboard were hurt, the State Patrol said. People in passing cars stopped and rushed to help, as rescue crews came speeding by land and air.

Some of the passengers were ejected as the bus rolled, a State Patrol spokesman said. Three people, including the driver, were in critical condition at a Rochester hospital.

The driver, Ed Erickson, of Elgin, apparently suffered a ruptured aneurysm in his chest, causing him to lose consciousness, the Rochester Post-Bulletin reported today. The newspaper attributed that to Randy Lavoie, a spokesman for Strain Bus Line of Rochester, the bus operator that runs the monthly trips from Rochester to Diamond Jo Casino in Northwood, Iowa.

Capt. Matt Langer of the Minnesota State Patrol said today he couldn't confirm the report that Erickson suffered an aneurysm.

He said none of the injured passengers died overnight.

Immediately after the crash, I-90 was shut down in both directions. Eastbound traffic resumed about 8 p.m., while the westbound lanes reopened before 10 p.m.

Kesler, 64, and his wife were part of a group on the Strain Tours bus coming back from the Diamond Jo Casino, off Interstate 35 near the Iowa-Minnesota border. With them: her four sisters and their husbands.

"We don't even know what happened," said Kesler. "It happened so fast."

"I was sitting toward the back, and the next thing I knew, the bus went over the median and flipped," Kesler said.

He was taken to Albert Lea Medical Center, where he was treated for bruising and cuts. Then he and his sons left for Austin, where his wife was being treated at Austin Medical Center.

"I got a lot of bumps and bruises, but I'm awfully lucky," Kesler said.

The critically injured were taken to Saint Marys Hospital in Rochester, said Dr. Chris Farmer, a critical care physician there. Some of them were on life support.

"It's truly tragic because every person on the bus was either injured or killed," said Andy Skoogman, a spokesman for the Department of Public Safety.

The injured were taken to Albert Lea Medical Center, Austin Medical Center and Saint Marys, where some remained overnight.

"The injuries range from being coherent and talking right now to very critical," Langer said.

According to Skoogman, the bus was heading east on Interstate 90 about 3:20 p.m. when, 2 miles west of Austin, it crossed the median and the westbound lanes. It ended up in the ditch, where it flipped over, landing with the door side down.

There was no construction going on in the area of the accident and weather was not a factor, Skoogman said.

Authorities said they were also getting conflicting accounts from the passengers.

'I'm just beside myself'

Dalmer Strain, the owner of the Rochester bus company, said the bus was headed back from the casino in Northwood, Iowa. Strain said that the trip was a weekly one and that the bus was making stops in Blooming Prairie, Kasson, Byron and Rochester.

"I'm just beside myself," Strain said as he was headed to the scene of the accident. "I don't know what happened."

Strain said he routed the trip for Erickson and was surprised to hear the bus was on Interstate 90. "Why he came across this way, I have no idea."

He said Erickson was in his 50s and had worked for the company when it was focused on school bus trips.

Strain said the trip was almost canceled, but eight or nine people called wanting to go at the last minute.

Kesler said after the crash, he and about five others climbed out of the bus. "It was silent. You didn't hear any screaming or yelling, nothing. People were numb, I think."

John Mauer of Albert Lea was driving home on I-90 after working in Austin when he saw the bus shoot across the median and into his lanes. Mauer and the car behind him veered over to the left while the bus kept going across, hitting the bank of the ditch, then ricocheted and flipped over. One of the front wheels appeared to be torn off.

"It came so close that when I got home I picked grass that was under the bus off my wipers," said Mauer.

A woman driving behind who stopped to help told Mauer that the bus seemed to fly through the air.

Once he had avoided the bus and brought his vehicle to a halt, Mauer ran to the back door of the bus. "You could hear people scrambling around and moaning. Some people, you could tell were really injured," Mauer said.

He said he worked to try to keep everyone in their places on the overturned bus. One man went out the front window.

Mauer talked briefly with the driver, who had a cut on his head and kept passing out. He asked the driver how many people were on the bus, because it looked so empty. He could count only 15 on the bus and the man who jumped off, who Mauer said had been sitting behind the driver.

The man told Mauer that as soon as the bus started heading off the interstate, he turned to check out the driver and he appeared to be slumped over the steering wheel.

Company history

According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, Strain Tours has reported no crashes in the past 24 months. The company has four buses and six drivers, according to agency records.

In 2002, Bold Lines, the corporate name of the bus company, paid $20,000 to settle an enforcement case over drug testing for drivers, according to the federal safety agency. It also paid $300 to settle a case over driver duty times and recordkeeping.

The agency has advised roadside inspectors to inspect the company's vehicles because of safety concerns, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration website.

On Monday, the Department of Transportation announced a new plan to increase safety on buses. The proposal includes electronic on-board recording devices, seat belts and more medical oversight for drivers.

Soon after the bus rolled over, Saint Marys hospital also received victims from two separate accidents in the Rochester area; one involved a school bus and a car and another involved an ambulance and a couple of cars, Farmer said. Eight children on the bus suffered minor injuries. One victim from the car in that accident is in critical condition. The injuries suffered in the ambulance collision were minor, Farmer said.

On Wednesday night, Julie Gram was at Austin Medical Center visiting her grandmother Adele Larson, who suffered bruised ribs in the Strain Tours bus crash. "She's OK, thank God. I don't think a lot of them will be going on this bus trip again soon," Gram said.

Just walking down the hall on her grandmother's floor, there were a lot of people with bumps, bruises and fractures, she said.

Gram said she knows people from the bus company and had spoken with them. "They're just so crushed and tearful." Asked if they know what happened, she said, "I wonder if they'll ever know."

The Associated Press contributed to this report. asimons@startribune • 612-673-4921 mlsmith@startribune.com • 612-673-4788 vtuss@startribune.com • 612-673-7692