Florida organization aims to protect students, hold drivers accountable by adding safety technology to school buses

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A program is working to make school buses safer for youths following a number of current accidents in Jacksonville.

Bus Patrol, which runs the worlds main stop-arm enforcement program, needs to use this system’s technology to assist hold drivers accountable in any scenario that probably can put youngsters in danger — though the current accidents which have occurred haven’t been due to stop-arm violations.

The organization makes use of technology to determine drivers illegally passing school buses when stop-arms are deployed. Bus Patrol officers stated because the starting of the school yr in Duval County, they’ve geared up 11 school buses with their technology and captured 688 violations throughout 99 completely different stops.

The CEO and Founder of Bus Patrol Jean Souliere stated it’s their mission to equip each school bus to protect youngsters.

“Every one of those violations can lead to very dire consequences for families,” Souliere stated.

A complete of 11 college students had been despatched to the hospital in October. The most up-to-date accident was Thursday when eight Westside High School students and the bus driver were hospitalized after a crash that police are unclear of who’s at fault.

In early October, three students were hurt when their school bus collided with a box truck on I-95. A day earlier than that crash, a Clay County school bus was involved in a crash with two students, who weren’t injured.

In November 2021, a bus driver crashed into multiple trees with four kids on board. The youngsters had been unhurt however the driver suffered minor accidents.

“Our technology is used in order to do accident reconstruction, and it goes well beyond the cameras actually, within our platform we can see the GPS of the bus, the speed of the bus, and watch the cameras while we’re looking at all this data as it happened. So we can see whether when the driver slammed on brakes or when they were hit and really give the tools for school districts and police to identify the cause of accidents,” Souliere stated.

Souliere stated this system is self-funded and is for free of charge to school districts. The fines from violators fund this system, and the remaining cash can return to the school.

Souliere additionally stated they want the assistance of the police, the school district and the neighborhood to push this program ahead.

“We really are hoping that these pilots are shining an important light that motivates the legislature in the state of Florida to move and to act in a way that going to help make the world a safer place for our kids,” Souliere stated.

Visit www.buspatrol.com to be taught extra about this system.