At least six people were killed in a horrific crash in eastern Ohio involving multiple vehicles, including a charter bus carrying high school students and chaperones, authorities say. The state highway patrol says 18 people were hospitalized after the bus was hit by a tractor-trailer on Interstate 70 around 26 miles east of Columbus Tuesday morning, CNN reports. Sean Grady, Licking County's emergency management director, confirmed the deaths but said that for now, the agency is not disclosing whether the victims are from the bus or other vehicles involved in the five-vehicle crash.
The students and chaperones from the Tuscarawas Valley Local School District were on their way to an Ohio School Boards Association conference in Columbus, where the high school band had been scheduled to perform, the Canton Repository reports. Grady said there were 57 people on the bus. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine called the crash "our worst nightmare, when we have a bus full of children involved in a crash, " NBC News reports. "Our hearts go out, our prayers to all the families, all those who were on the bus," he told reporters.
"This is is just a tragedy that no one can hardly ever imagine," said the governor. He described the school as a small one in a "tight-knit, rural" part of the state, per CNN. The charter bus company, Pioneer Trails, says it is cooperating with authorities, the AP reports. The National Transportation Safety Board has sent a team of investigators to the site. (More Ohio stories.)
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