Indiana Bus Crash Leaves 21 Hurt

LAFAYETTE, Ind. --

Twenty-one people were injured in a Greyhound bus crash early Wednesday morning on snow-covered Interstate 65 in Tippecanoe County.

The crash happened just south of Lafayette, at mile marker 164, at about 3:15 a.m., 6News' Julie Pursley reported.

All of the injuries were not life-threatening, according to Indiana State Police. Most of the injured had bumps, bruises or broken bones.

The bus was bound for Indianapolis and Atlanta from Chicago and had 43 passengers.

At the time of the crash, moderate snow was falling and temperatures were dropping.

ISP said the bus driver, Andre Wiley, 43, overcorrected when the bus lost traction, went off the left side of the road, spun around at least three times and hit a concrete bridge.

The bus careened into a ditch, went up an embankment and slid about 300 yards before coming to rest on the shoulder of the road.

One passenger said she woke up abruptly when she slammed into the wall of the bus.

"I know we went from side to side," the passenger said. "We were just slung all over the place. It was scary, but thank God we're alive."

"I felt the rear end of the bus sliding out," said passenger John Dabrowski. "I just kind of ducked and waited for it all to end."

Investigators said Wiley was going too fast for road conditions.

"When you start spinning running about 40 or 50 mph, they probably got bumped pretty good before he came to a stop," said ISP Sgt. Kim Riley.

The injured people were taken to nearby hospitals by ambulance. The rest were brought to a Red Cross shelter at Faith Baptist Church.

"What we did was just provide a safe place for them outside of the weather, outside of the cold," said volunteer Regina Lewis. "We helped about 25 people here. Some did have to leave to go to the hospital."

Natasha Gustafson, from Tennessee, is pregnant and was on the bus with her daughters, ages 5 and 6.

"I woke up and she was on the floor and the guy that was sitting next to us had a hold of her," Gustafson said.

Everyone 6News spoke with said they felt blessed to have walked away from the crash relatively unscathed.

Greyhound sent another bus to Lafayette to pick up the uninjured passengers and took them to Indianapolis just before 7 a.m.

The Red Cross and state police are working with those who are still in hospitals in Lafayette.