School Bus Overturns in Pr. George's

"They were telling him to slow down," Jonah Gordon, 13, said of the other students. "The girl on the bus, she asked him to slow down. He was talking and playing along."

"He kept swerving and swerving," Deshaun, 13, said.

"He was going fast when he hit the corner," said Alexis Perdomo, 13, who had been sitting near the front. "Right before we fell, somebody screamed out, 'The bus is falling over!'

"I was terrified. It was scary," Alexis said. "Everybody was crying. All you heard was people screaming, glass shattering everywhere."

"While it's turning, everybody was screaming, 'Ooooh!,' " Jonah said. "We were all discombobulated."

When the bus finally screeched to a halt, diagonally across 61st Place and pointing northwest, the students clambered over one another to get their bearings. Alexis was unhurt: A student beneath him had cushioned his fall. Deshaun scraped her right cheek and had a swollen forehead and stiff knee. Jonah hurt his back. Sitting in the back row, he was the closest to the emergency exit, and after a few seconds, he took action.

"In my mind, all I was thinking was, 'I gotta get out of here, I gotta do something,' " he said. "I kicked the door, and it flew open."

The students piled out and began calling relatives, some of whom came to the scene as emergency responders took stock of the injuries.

"She was screaming at the top of her lungs" over the phone, Deshaun's mother recalled. "I told her to quit screaming because I couldn't understand. . . . I was panicking."

Twenty students and the driver were taken to Prince George's Hospital Center in Cheverly; the rest were taken to Doctors Community Hospital in Lanham. Most of the injuries were bumps and bruises, said School Superintendent John E. Deasy, who visited students and their families yesterday.

The bus was in reasonably good shape after the accident. A few windows on the side that struck the ground were damaged; one of the hatches on the roof had been opened. The front window on the driver's side was intact. After two tow trucks lifted the bus back into position, it looked as if the vehicle might very well drive again.

The extent of the driver's injuries was unclear, although they were not life-threatening. White said Robinson had been released yesterday. A phone number listed in his name was disconnected.

"Our preliminary investigation indicates he is at fault in this instance," Maj. Kevin Davis, commander of Police District 1, said of the driver. "He tried to beat the traffic. . . . It was the pure speed of the school bus during that left-hand turn." Davis didn't know the speed at which the bus was traveling.

County school officials said they would reserve judgment until the investigation concludes.

"We'll meet with him and hear his side before making any final decisions," White said of Robinson.

"The school system works in a uniform disciplinary process," Deasy said. If the charges of negligent driving are true, he said, "the employee would be dismissed."

Staff writer Hamil R. Harris and researcher Karl Evanzz contributed to this report.