CALIFORNIA: 10 high school students Killed in California Bus Crash, Leaves Multiple Injured.....I just heard this loud boom," he said. "We knew we were in major trouble." Many escaped through a window that someone had kicked open, running for their lives to the other side of the freeway before hearing an explosion and seeing the bus burst into flame. The students were travelling to Humboldt State University

AP  | by  FENIT NIRAPPIL and LISA LEFF Posted: 04/10/2014 10:43 pm EDT Updated: 04/11/2014 2:59 am EDT
ORLAND, Calif. (AP) — A FedEx tractor-trailer crossed a grassy freeway median Thursday in Northern California and slammed into a bus carrying high school students on a visit to a college. At least nine were killed in the fiery crash, authorities said.
View image on TwitterMassive flames could be seen devouring both vehicles just after the crash, and clouds of smoke billowed into the sky until firefighters had quenched the fire, leaving behind scorched black hulks of metal. Bodies were draped in blankets inside the burned-out bus.
CHP Officer Lacy Heitman said the driver of the tractor-trailer was among the dead. CHP dispatchers initially said the bus driver also died, but Heitman said investigators were working to identify the eight victims on the bus, which carried between 44 and 48 students, four chaperones and the driver.
The crash happened a little after 5:30 p.m. on Interstate 5 near Orland, a small city about 100 miles north of Sacramento.
Steven Clavijo, 18, a student at West Ranch High School in Santa Clarita, told The Associated Press that he was on the bus during the crash.
For hours during the long drive north, the students — from several different schools in the Los Angeles area — watched movies and listened to hip-hop on the radio, Clavijo said.
But just as he was trying to get some sleep in his seat in the back of the bus, he said he felt the vehicle shake from left to right. "I just heard this loud boom," he said. "We knew we were in major trouble." Many escaped through a window that someone had kicked open, running for their lives to the other side of the freeway before hearing an explosion and seeing the bus burst into flame.
The bus was one of two that the admissions office at Humboldt State University had chartered to bring prospective students from Southern California to tour the Arcata campus, Humboldt's Vice President of Administrative Affairs Joyce Lopes said. The bus was owned by Silverado Stages, a tour bus company based in San Luis Obisbo. The company said in a statement on its website Thursday night that it was assisting authorities in gathering information.  "Our top priority is making sure that the injured are being cared for," Silverado Stages said.
Humboldt State's President Rollin Richmond issued a statement on the school's website. "Our hearts go out to those who have been affected, and we are here to support them, and their families, in any way possible," Richmond said.
Humboldt State spokesman Simon Chabel said the school was working to confirm where in Southern California the students on the wrecked bus are from.
"There is still a lot of information to be gathered, and we are working as hard as we can to gather that information and communicate it as best as we can to parents and other family members during this terrible tragedy," he said.
Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy said an unknown number of students from Manual Arts Senior High School and Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools were on the trip. He did not know whether they were on the bus involved in the crash.
A high school senior from Alliance Renee & Meyer Luskin Academy High School in Los Angeles said she and a few of her classmates who were accepted to the university were invited to go on the tour.  more

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