A thanksgiving ceremony was held yesterday in the auditorium of the Belize Adventist College in Calcutta, Corozal, thanking God for sparing the lives of eighteen of the school’s students who were on a bus headed to the college that collided with an SUV last Thursday. There were no major injuries, although eight of the students experienced various discomforts and bruises, and in a few cases, minor injuries (one student was thrown out of the bus due to the impact of the collision, but was not seriously injured.)
The students have all recovered and have since returned to school.
On Thursday, January 23, at about 7:00 in the morning, the school bus collided with a Jeep Cherokee on the Philip Goldson Highway between Miles 69 and 70.
The thanksgiving ceremony was attended by the student body, teachers and invited guests from the Ministry of Education. After the prayers, the students who were involved in the accident spoke about their experience of the event. They were all given purple ribbons for their bravery.
In an interview with CTV 3, Pamela Heron, a teacher and counselor at the school, said that the collision could have been tragic, and by means of the ceremony the school was showing gratitude to God and acknowledging those individuals who assisted in the immediate aftermath of the collision.
Those individuals were a Scotia Bank official who stopped and helped to transport students who needed to go to the hospital, and personnel from the Ministry of Education, who were with them throughout the entire day, and who even brought lunch for them.
Police say that the school bus was heading from Orange Walk to Calcutta and was being driven by Lawrence Tillett at the time of the accident, and the Cherokee was being driven by Eusebio Urbina, 57, a construction worker of San Roman, Corozal.
Urbina, who was travelling from the direction of Santa Clara towards Buena Vista, reportedly lost control of the Jeep, causing him to drive into the left lane into the incoming traffic. As a result, he slammed into the left front portion of the school bus, which was traveling in the opposite direction. The impact of the crash caused the school bus to run into a cane field on the left side of the highway.