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NBC 4 New York
A mini school bus leaving a Catholic elementary school crashed into a house in Syosset, Long Island in New York on Wednesday.
A school bus driver, who authorities said passed out behind the wheel and crashed into a house on Long Island, N.Y. while children were aboard, has been arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated, according to police.
Frederick Flowers, 66, was leaving a Catholic elementary school Wednesday afternoon when he had what fire officials initially referred to as a "medical emergency of some kind," and veered into the house on Teibrook Avenue on Long Island at about 3:15 p.m. ET, authorities said.
Read original story on NBCNewYork.com
The five children on the bus ranged in age from 5 to 8, but none were injured, police said. They attend St. Edward the Confessor School in Syosset, N.Y.
Flowers was airlifted to Nassau University Medical Center. His condition was not released.
The Massapequa Park, N.Y., man was later arrested and charged with five counts of aggravated driving while intoxicated under Leandra's Law, five counts of endangering the welfare of a child, five counts of reckless endangerment and two counts of driving while intoxicated.
He will be arraigned as soon as it is practical, police said. Information on an attorney wasn't available.
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Homeowner Christina Percell was devastated to find her house of 15 years destroyed when she returned from the bank with her daughter.
"We got out of the car, and we see that there's a school bus in the garage," she told NBCNewYork.com. "Totally, totally shocked."
Two small dogs were inside the house at the time, but they were OK.
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So was he on new medicine or something and did not consider how it could affect him first before driving?
Ahh, never mind then. Apparently DWI is usually alcohol while DUI can be either alcohol or drugs (including prescriptions).
Actually, in NY it is DWI for driving with a BAC over .08 while it is DWAI (ability impaired) for drugs. You can also be charged with DWAI with a BAC from .05-.07 if the officer feels you are still impaired by the alcohol or other contributing factors.
Personally, I do not believe there is enough alcohol in the world that would get me to drive a bus full of kids.
if u all read the big blue writing above the pic it states DWI wich has nothing to do with pills the schools need to start giving breathalizers to there drivers even better yet install them on the bus so it wont start.everyone so worried about the harmless sh-- .you dont pay attention to the drunks in our school system,schools shouldnt hire any one that drinks alc,there is no room for that volitile combination a tempermental drunk and kids
Hey bob,it wasn't a bus full of kids,it was only five.And second of all they didn't say alcohol,they said medication,meaning perscription drugs.Which is legel with a prescription.But even if he washed them down with a beer he wouldn't be drunk.
There is no mention of "medication" in this article. However, the article does mention Leandra's Law, which has to do with driving drunk with children under 15 in vehicle.
This is what happens when one relies on God to do the driving.
Too funny Bob.
W.T.F. - short for What The @!$%# - you named yourself correctly...gawd nit pickers are a pain in the ass.
JS in SD; you made a post shorter than 500 words - you feeling under the weather today?
So much for all that bragging about how great Catholic schools are - human after all...lol.
It looks like in the picture it's a short bus, that may have something to do with it, mayby.
I looked him up. He looks like a regular Obama voter. He will soon join the millions of them behind bars.
I will say he is a very darkly complected man.
Dude, just shut the f*ck up with the racism. 41 million WHITE people voted for Obama in 2008. Care to reply with something that's equally retarded as your last comment?
I only questioned if it was something medication related, like a bad reaction because they said he suffered a "medical emergency of some kind". Usually they just blatantly put "drunk driving" in the article. I know you can be charged with being under the influence of driving, even if it was from a legal medication prescription or non-prescription however I forgot the exact terminology for it.
let the lawsuits commence.................
" to find her house of 15 years destroyed"
Grow up, it was in the garage. Some damage of course but a long, long way from being a "destroyed" house.
pjam09
Doesn't look like it was a garage. It has plants right in front so no drive. Don't be a jerk, their house was half destroyed.
The kids finally got to use that emergency escape from buses training.
@pjam09 - It is very possible that the impact shifted the entire house on it's foundation even though the impact was only to the garage area. If you look at the photo, it appears that the left front corner of the roof is elevated which would indicate that this may have happened. If the entire house has been shifted on the foundation it may very well mean it is more cost effective to tear it down and rebuild it than to try and effect repairs. Shifting the house on the foundation can cause a lot of damage that may not be all that visible, like breaking all the drain and water pipe connections and undermining the entire structural integrity of the house. I would not be all that surprised if the house turns out to be a total loss.
Grow up, really?? I think she had every reason to be upset. Most people sound more upset if they get in a fenderbender, much less a bus through their garage. It's not an easy fix, that is probably going to inconvience her family's life for quite a while. Plus who knows what they had stored in the garage that was destroyed.
Repeat after me; Home Owners Insurance. Bus Company Insurance. Repeat it until it sinks in.
Grow up, it was in the garage. Some damage of course but a long, long way from being a "destroyed" house
Way to show compassion there. It was an attached garage...attached to their home...so yes, the home was destroyed. Not only that, but now there's the issue of their safety and security.
so evidently you also have to be "special" to DRIVE the short bus...............:)
Reason number 17 never to ride the "short bus", drunken bus driver.
No, read on, thats what he said at first, NOW he is charged with DWI. He was drinking and driving kids on a school bus. Time for hard time for this jerk. for a few years anyway.
I'm happy that they put him in hospital, and really got the reason right. DWI. What a jackas*s.
If I was the school administrator, he would get fired!
dwi results in loss of license....so he will be...............
First Student is a bus company, not a local school's bus where the school hires the driver. I have the same company that provides bus service to my local area schools. That is what most schools have reverted to is contracted bus services. It would be nice to see if this driver has had past issues of this nature and if so, the question should be asked why was the driver hired. This would be a legal issue that the company would/should be liable if the driver was hired with these past issues.
Have to have a commercial license to drive a bus and DWI is a instant cancel with no opportunity to get another for a long time. So he will have find another line of work for the next year at least.
I had to send the picture around to some of my committee members. We have had nothing but bad issues since our school district was FORCED to contract out to this company. I didn't even read the article, so I apologize for this, but:
I AM NOT SURPRISED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
hey kid hold the wheel a minute while i make another drink real quick............crap...dropped my olive.......
LOL!!!!!!!!
Thank goodness the children are ok and so are the family that owns the house. This could have been real bad. I hope the parents of the children do not make much out of this to their children with over reacting.
Kids can just brush off things like it was no big deal. Parents make it the worst tragedy on the face of the earth.
Maybe these bus drivers need to take a breath test before they start their shift. I don't know what else that can be done so it does not happen again.
I think 66 is to old to be a bus driver anyways. Reflexes slow down and not aware quick enough.
I have to disagree about 66 being too old. Many of these older bus drivers do this since it doesn't pay very well (not enough to support a family) but it does supplement their SS income. But age does have it's limits and I would think 80 is too old - but it depends on how active the person is. We have an older driver (probably about 70) on our local transit system and he's by far the best driver out there. Last week he was already in his 13th hour of his shift - THIRTEENTH - when I got off the bus and asked him why he was doing an evening shift (shortage of bus drivers since classes began in this college town). He is so kind and considerate compared to the younger drivers who will see someone trying to run to catch the bus and ignore them. There's another one who LOVES braking hard - especially when it's standing room only. On the other hand, there are some VERY rude passengers. For what they put up with, the low pay isn't worth it!
I read a study last year that discussed the high rate of alcohol abuse in senior citizens. This man not only should not be driving children, he should not be allowed to be around children when drunk.
Duh....
I read a study once that said most people post stupid stuff on the internet
Mr. Frederick will be doing time... guaranteed. Those are some pretty heavy charges...
Due to his age, he'll probably get a reduced sentence, lose his license (even for personal), pay a hefty fine, be forced to go to AA and do some community service while on parole.
The bus company will be lucky if the only have to pay a small settlement to the parents and the homeowner. Plus they'll be under investigation as well by the state as to how this guy got hired, etc. Of course, lawmakers will see this as an opportunity to put even tighter restrictions on hiring procedures for bus drivers, etc.
Lucky the kids were not hurt. Ditto the dogs. And California is trying to legalize pot? That will be a free for all on our kids!
TRYING to?!?! They pretty much have with the ease of getting a "prescription" and the complete lack of followup or checking system on said prescriptions... My hubby was approach 8 times while he took a 1 hour walk in San Fran - EIGHT TIMES! and asked if he wanted to buy a scrip... He is a military officer and looks it, all anal-renentive looking; definately does NOT look like someone who would smoke a doobee....
Is ALREADY scary IMHO and I will not be moving to California anytime soon!!
@more2bits-4021678
Hey look, another ignorant closed-minded neocon who has no idea what he's talking about.
@Jenn S-2267056
Good, the last thing California needs is more draconian types telling people what they can and can't put in their own bodies.
There is no way military officers smoke weed dude , no way. Being anal retentive is a proud US military tradition ,why was he out cruising in the bushes again ?
more2bits and Jenn S - I agree with FlatIron! Before getting carried away with your govt-propaganda-induced idiotic comments, check out some REAL facts! Alcohol is considerably MORE dangerous than weed! Weed doesn't rot your liver nor incite violent behavior like alcohol. While one should NOT drive under the influence of weed or alcohol, the 'average' pothead completely mellows out - become rather unmotivated. I do not smoke weed and can't stand the smell but I completely support the legalization AND taxation of this 'cash-crop'. There are so many incredible uses for the hemp and it's criminal we aren't taking advantage of this most useful product. Instead of cutting down MORE trees for paper, we could use hemp (not to mention its use for clothing, rope and a million more uses).
I'm SO SICK of all the fuddy-duddies knocking something they know so little about - except what they were spoon fed for several decades with FALSE information. For once, use the internet for what it was created for: retrieving [reliable] information. Even my 81-yr-old father, a very conservative Libertarian, has pushed for legalization for many years now knowing what we're losing every minute in what could be gained in taxation. Wake up!
That's right down the road from us near the Catholic School. I'll take a look when I go out for a run later today.
This sort of thing happens more then you would think on LI.
if i were the parent of one of those kids, that driver would have another 'medical emergency of some kind' headed his way.
He most likely drinks and drives most of the time. It finally caught up with him. He's going down.
And you know this how?
When I was a kid, I had a bus driver that only had one arm and drove a stick shift. He could shift, steer, and open the manual door with one arm. No one messed with him. Legend had it that he lost the arm in a knife fight. So where did they find this loser?
He must have been a Democrat bus driver , if he was Republican he would have brought a gun to the knife fight!
They need to push back that Happy Hour...LOL
At least there were no injuries outside of the drunken idiot himself.
every hour is happy hour to a drunk.
you people commenting are all just the epitomy of the ugly american...
'i see alot of lawsuits...good thing the dogs are ok... i'll have a gawk when i go jogging...you have to also be 'special' to drive the short bus...'
maybe it was just god punishing the catholics, or yes just a drunk that should never have been hired. why don't you all just vote for mitt high priest of LDS romney, and jesus will come save you all. do you know how freaking silly the US has become to the rest of the observing world? a corpse of an empire, still having some capitalist chemotherapy, the rich steal it all, the poor get shafted, 3rd world poverty of starving and obese a third of the population, failing in all progress. no wonder more mexicans went home than arrived the last years. poor obama for even bothering to give it his best, not an optimistic outlook for the US for decades.
And what exactly does your insane rant of a paragraph have to do with the matter at hand. I could say that the rest of the world is a joke from my viewpoint too, but that doesn't make it valid.
Don't understand why there is two counts of DUI.
Considering the fact that alcohol IS a drug, a drug that causes more misery, violence, death and broken marriages than all other drugs combined, it always pisses me off when people say "alcohol OR drugs. The fact that alcohol is the drug of choice for many, and the fact that it is a legal drug, doesn't seem to matter to those who consume alcohol because in their minds they'll never be drug users, which in fact is exactly what they are.
It's time the church stops passing out the holy wine before school starts.
First Student is a horrible bus company. While I live on the other side of the US, I've seen their drivers block intersections, driveways, pick up students on the highway (illegal out here), cut people off without turn singles, etc. It doesn't surprise me at all to find their hiring practices lax enough to hire potentially drunk drivers. It only surprises me it doesn't happen more often with First Student.
It is just breathtaking to see how bad some people can screw up on the job in such a lousy economy. Luckily nobody was killed. If this bus driver avoids jail time, he will end up either unemployed or trying to survive New York City on a minimum wage job.
<duplicate>
California, like most states, has a zero tolerance for school bus drivers, which means that if you register0.001 BAC, you will have your license revoked and be fired. If you are taking Rx drugs that MIGHT affect your driving...
1. Ask the doctor prescribing the drug.
2. Ask the Pharmacist
3. "Sit out" the first dose until you are certain.
This driver should have known all of this as I am sure that the laws about school Bus drivers in NY are similar to those in CA.
Also, since the bus was owned by First Student and the driver was hired by them, the policies of the Company are the same in NY as anywhere else.
This guy violated all of them. They should throw the book at him.
He has absolutely no excuse for his behaviour.