About 5:28 a.m. (local time) on Tuesday, March 13, 2018, a 2018 Prevost 56-passenger motorcoach, occupied by a 65-year-old male driver and 46 passengers, was traveling westbound on Interstate 10 (I-10) in Baldwin County near Loxley, Alabama. The motorcoach was part of a two-motorcoach chartered tour operated by First Class Tours & Charters of Houston, Texas, which was transporting students from Channelview High School, who were returning to Houston from a trip to Disney World in Orlando, Florida.
At the crash location, I-10 is a four-lane divided highway with a posted speed limit of 70 mph; its eastbound and westbound travel lanes are divided by an earthen center median. The weather conditions were reported as dry and clear.
The crash event began when the 2018 Prevost motorcoach departed the westbound lanes at a shallow angle of about 5 degrees, crossed the center median, traveled into and across the opposing eastbound travel lanes and onto the far eastbound shoulder, striking the guardrail adjacent to the south shoulder of the roadway. The guardrail redirected the motorcoach, which went back across the eastbound travel lanes and returned to the center median.
At some point in this sequence of events following the departure from the intended westbound travelway, an adult passenger realized that the motorcoach driver was unresponsive. This passenger called the driver by name and, receiving no response, got out of his own seat and shook the driver. Again failing to get a response, the passenger grabbed and pulled on the steering wheel.
After traveling for more than a quarter-mile (1,561 feet) off its intended course, the motorcoach—now traveling roughly westbound in the median—drove off the roadway and fell into the Cowpen Creek ravine, which was spanned by two separate bridges for the eastbound and westbound I-10 roadways. At the bottom of the ravine, the motorcoach came to rest on its passenger side with its roof wedged against a vertical bridge support.
As a result of the crash, the motorcoach driver received fatal injuries, and all 46 motorcoach passengers were injured; 15 passengers sustained serious injuries and 31 passengers sustained minor injuries.
We determined that the probable cause of the motorcoach roadway departure and crash into a ravine near Loxley, Alabama, was the incapacitation of the driver due to an unknown medical event.
