1 child dead, 45 people hurt in Arkansas charter bus crash
BENTON, Ark. (AP) — Arkansas State Police say 45 people, most of them children, have been injured in a fatal crash involving a charter bus that was carrying a youth football team from Tennessee.
Police say one child was killed in the Monday morning accident along Interstate 30 near Benton, which is about 25 miles southwest of Little Rock. State police say the charter bus was traveling from Texas to Memphis, Tennessee.
Memphis TV station WMC reports that the bus was carrying a football team from the Orange Mound Youth Association in Tennessee that had played in a tournament in Dallas over the weekend. The station reports the children are elementary-school age.
State Police spokesman Bill Sadler says the injured were taken to several hospitals in Little Rock and Benton. Authorities initially said 40 people had been injured, but Sadler said later Monday that number had increased to 45.
Sadler tells Little Rock television station KATV that a child was confirmed dead on the bus. He says many of the children had cellphones and were able to contact their parents.
Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock says it has 24 patients from the wreck. The hospital says all of the patients are in stable condition, though details about the injures weren’t immediately available. A family center has been set up to help parents reunite with their children.
