RCMP say there are no serious injuries after a charter bus carrying 30 people crashed on a remote Forest Service Road about 90 minutes north of Prince George this morning.
Corporal Jennifer Cooper, the Media Relations Officer for the Prince George RCMP, tells RadioNL the bus was carrying pipeline workers when the crash happened on the Firth Lake Forest Service Road near Hambone Road around 8:30 a.m. Friday.
“Our initial reports aren’t suggesting any very serious injuries for which we are thankful but it is definitely a large amount of people to be transporting from such a remote location and to our hospital here,” Cooper said.
“So we’re talking more like cuts, scrapes, and broken bones that kind of thing and not like critical patients?” RadioNL’s Brett Mineer asked Cooper.
“That is what our initial reports are sounding like, yes,” she said.
Cooper said the situation could change as more information came in.
“Updates may be made available as they come in but again because of the road conditions out there, we’ve had heavy rain this morning as well, so that is making everything a bit more mucky,” Cooper said. “Our updates are going to be a little bit more sporadic than normal as we allow people to assess the situation and then begin their transport back.”
A BCEHS spokesperson told RadioNL they transported 17 people from the scene in a “wide range of conditions.” A number of them have already been discharged from hospital.
“From the scene three were reported critical,” Amy Crofts, Communications Manager, with the Ministry of Health, told RadioNL. “Upon further assessment at hospital, one was considered critical and the rest less urgent.”
Northern Health spokesperson Eryn Collins said the University Hospital of Northern B.C. in Prince George activated a Code Orange, which is used in cases where an influx of patients is expected that could overwhelm the hospital.
“When a code orange is called that can include bringing in additional staff resources, assessing patients that are already in the hospital or patients who are in the emergency department for any ability to have them discharged or transferred in order to increase capacity to receive patients from a particular incident,” Collins said.
Collins said a bus has been sent to the site of the crash to transport anyone who is not seriously injured.
The cause of the crash is still unclear, but though Mounties say the early-morning rain on the gravel road made the conditions “quite poor.”
– With files from The Canadian Press
