UPDATED: Bus May Have Hit Overpass Support; Blocked Southbound Truck Lanes

Two men who died in a bus crash on the NJ Turnpike in East Brunswick on Monday evening had been ejected from the bus, with one dying at the scene and another later at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, police said.

The bus traveled along a grassy median between the southbound lanes before hitting a concrete overpass support below the onramp to the southbound "cars-only" lanes from Route 18 at Exit 9, according to the press release.

Police said the front-end impact may have caused the rear of the bus to come off the ground and hit the bottom of the overpass.  The bus then went across all three of the southbound truck lanes and hit a dirt embankment on the right side of the highway with its front end.  The rear of the bus remained in the right lane, according to the press release.

Wang, who was driving the bus, was ejected through the windshield and landed about 15 feet from the bus.  State Trooper Keith Hamlin was the first on scene and began CPR on the victim, who died of his injuries and was later declared dead at the scene, according to the press release.

A passenger, Troy Nguyen, 20, of Royersford, Pa., was partially ejected through the most rear drivers-side window.  An off-duty fireman and other troopers from Cranbury Station carefully pulled Nguyen back in through the window and stabilized him until medics arrived.  He was transported to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick where he died of head injuries. 

As of this morning, Louis Pierre, 50, of Philadelphia, and David R. Choi, 70, of Landsdale, Pa., are both listed in critical condition at Robert Wood Johnson. Both are believed to have been sitting near the rear of the bus. 

The bus had 43 people on board including the driver, all of them injured to some extent.  There were three children on board--11-year-old twin boys and a 2-year-old boy--who were not injured.

According to police, the cause of the crash has not been determined and state troopers that specialize in commercial carriers and fatal crash investigations will continue the investigation, including further examination of the bus, which has been impounded.  Investigators will be gathering physical evidence, including pieces of a tire that have been taken to determine when in the sequence of events that tire blew out, as well as data that may have been recorded on the bus' electronics, according to the press release.

In addition, the medical examiner's office will perform an autopsy to determine whether the driver suffered any medical issue prior to the crash, police said. The crash investigation  may take several weeks. Troopers arriving within the first minutes described a scene that was initially chaotic, with injured people everywhere, said the press release.  They were forced to bypass some victims to aid more severely injured people, police said. 

Numerous first aid and fire companies responded, transporting victims to Robert Wood Johnson hospitals in New Brunswick and Rahway, John F. Kennedy Edison, Raritan Bay Medical Center in Perth Amboy and Old Bridge, and St. Peters University Hospital in New Brunswick, according to the press release. The outer roadway of the southbound Turnpike was shut down for six hours with traffic being diverted to the inner, cars-only lanes. 

The 1999 Van Hool bus was operated by Super Luxury Tours, Inc., of Wilkes Barre, Pa.  It started in the Chinatown section of New York and was heading to Philadelphia.

A report by the Newark Star-Ledger says the company had one of the lowest rankings by the U.S. Department of Transportation. You can find that story by clicking here.  

A copy of reports referenced in the Ledger story can be found here. 

Here is another report that shows the company had four accidents in four years and a satisfactory rating as of this month.