Here’s The Law In NH About Passing Stopped School Buses

During a six-month period from August 2018 to March 2019, 12 children were killed and another 47 were injured while getting on and off school buses. Bus stop-arms were extended at the time, which means motorists were required to come to a full stop.

There are some differences in laws from state to state. New Hampshire's law requires stopping at least 25 feet from a school bus that has flashing red lights, whether you are driving toward or from behind the bus. Drivers must stay put until the bus starts again or the red lights stop flashing.

Those who violate the law are subject to a fine of between $100-$750 for a first offense and $250-$1,000 for a subsequent offense, as well as a 30-day suspension of their driver's license for subsequent offenses.

Close calls are common. Merrimack police said a driver who sped by a stopped school bus nearly hit a student. Police stepped up patrols and school buses were equipped with cameras to catch violators.

"If someone's going to blow by a bus and not care, unfortunately we don't have control over that, but we want to get the word out there," Merrimack Police Capt. Matthew Tarleton said. "It's been an issue for years. That's an unfortunate thing that takes place every year."

The potential for fatal and injury accidents exists every day, according to the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services.

The Kansas Department of Education conducts a one-day count of school bus passing incidents every year. In its most recent count, it estimated that as 15 million vehicles could be improperly passing school buses transporting students each school year, gambling with children’s lives.

In a one-week period last fall, five children were killed and six were injured in five separate incidents involving drivers who passed stopped school buses. Three Rochester, Indiana, siblings — 6-year-old twins and their 9-year-old stepsister — were killed and another student was hurt on Oct. 29, 2018, while they were waiting for their school bus, which authorities said had its stop arm extended and lights flashing.

A day later, a 9-year-old boy in Mississippi was killed in the Tupelo, Mississippi, suburb of Pratts while crossing a highway to catch the school bus. The driver accused of striking the child was arrested and charged with one count of aggravated assault.

On the same day, a kindergarten student in Tallahassee, Florida, was injured when he was struck by a car while crossing the street to board his school bus. The bus had extended the crossing arm, and the driver of the vehicle told police he realized too late that the bus had stopped.

On Nov. 1, five children were injured while waiting for the bus in Tampa, Florida. Two adults were also hurt when a vehicle heading eastbound hit the group. Witnesses said the driver of the vehicle had been speeding before the crash.

Also that day, a second-grade student was killed at a bus stop in a hit-and-run accident Tyrone, Pennsylvania. The boy was already dead when the bus driver pulled up to the stop and called 911, the Tyrone Area School District superintendent said in a statement of the hit-and-run accident.

States are taking various approaches to the problem.

For example, 22 states have now passed stop-arm camera laws to catch motorists who pass school buses when they’re stopped to pick up or let off children. They include Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wyoming.

California doesn’t have a stop-arm camera law, but takes a unique approach with a law that has been in place since 1932 that requires school bus drivers to walk with students in grades kindergarten through eight when they need to cross a roadway, according to School Transportation News. The driver must verbally tell students when it’s safe to cross, rather than use hand signals that could be mistaken for a motorist’s signal to proceed. The law also requires the driver to shut off the bus and remove the keys.

“There are a multitude of options out there,” National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services President Michael LaRocco told School Transportation News last year. “There’s not one silver bullet out there, other than the simplest silver bullet — motorists need to pay attention to what’s going on around them.”

If not operated properly, vehicles are weapons that “will kill kids,” LaRocco said. “We need to look at the idea of doing more instruction at a public level with the motorists. … We can do [driver and student] training forever and a day, but we can’t stop a motorist that’s not paying attention.”

Research shows that driver distraction, especially with increased cellphone use, creates hazards on the road. But students are distracted, too, and don’t always pay attention to traffic before they cross the road, sometimes because they’re listening to music through earbuds or headphones.

The most dangerous part of the “danger zone” for students is the 10-foot area around the entire school bus when it stops, according to the School Bus Safety Company. The trainers there advise that if there’s a crossing gate installed on the bus, students should walk the length, about 10 feet, then check for traffic and wait for the driver’s signal to cross.

Then, or if no such equipment is installed, students should walk to the edge of the bus bumper, stop and check for traffic, then cross the street.

That’s particularly important for young students. The national school bus stop survey conducted annually by the Kansas Department of Education found that 73 percent of the students who were killed while getting on or off the bus over the past 48 years were 9 years old or younger.

“Would you let your 5- or 6-year-old cross the street by themselves?” Dick Fischer, a former school transportation director in California who now owns Transportation Consultant Group, says in safety training courses. A proponent of laws like the one in California, he asks: “Is it safer for you to cross the kids, or is it safer for you to sit in your seat and wave the kid on?”