On a cold and cloudy morning, after a period of heavy rains and thaw, a Floyd Countyschool bus loaded with 48 elementary and high school students bound for school in Prestonsburg, Kentucky struck the rear of a wrecker truck on U.S. Route 23 and fell down an embankment into the swollen waters of the Levisa Fork of the Big Sandy River, where it was swept downstream and submerged.[1]
National Guard and other authorities and agencies responded to the disaster. On March 5, 1958, governor Happy Chandler ordered 500 national guardsmen from 9 different cities to join the effort to find those still missing.[2] The bus was finally located by Navy divers, and removed from the river 53 hours later.[1]
Twenty-two children escaped the bus in the first few minutes as it became fully submerged in the raging flood stage waters and made it safely out of the river. However, 26 other children and the bus driver drowned.
Nannie Joyce McPeek, 13, of Lancer, Kentucky. She was predeceased by her parents, Allen Roby McPeek and Roma McPeek. At the time of her death, she was living with the Cline family.[4]
Bucky Ray Jarrell, 15, of Sugar Loaf, Kentucky.[3][4]
Doris Faye Burchett, 15, of Emma, Kentucky. Her body was found on April 16, 1958. Her uncle, Graham Burchett, headed volunteer search efforts to help recover bodies from the crash site for months after the crash.[6]
The crash would become the impetus behind the formation of the Floyd County Emergency & Rescue Squad, founded by volunteers on April 27, 1958. To this day, the FCERS remains a 100% volunteer agency, and assists local police departments, volunteer fire departments, and EMS with auto extrication, search and rescue, fireground support, and EMS first response in addition to its original role as the primary water rescue agency for the area.
The 27-person death toll is tied with the Carrollton bus disaster in 1988 for the third highest number of fatalities resulting from a bus crash. Both happened in Kentucky and in each, the victims were all thought to have survived the initial collisions, but were unable to safely evacuate the school-type buses afterwards. After the 1988 crash, Kentucky changed its public school bus equipment requirements to require nine emergency exits. This is the highest number of emergency exits required on school buses by any state or Canadian province.
Several months later, two American recording artists released songs about the crash: The Stanley Brothers, with "No School Bus in Heaven," and Ralph Bowman, with "The Tragedy of Bus 27." Neither made the national BillboardHot 100 charts, but they did receive regional airplay in some parts of the country.
In recent years the accident has been the subject of two documentary films, The Very Worst Thing and A Life of Its Own, and the site of the bus accident has been marked by a sign bearing a dark image of a school bus superimposed with the names of the children and driver that died. There is usually a wreath of plastic flowers on the guardrail in front of the sign, which is located on Route 1428 (old US 23) 0.6 miles (0.97 km) east of the intersection of Route 302.
