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It’s not often you find one federal agency criticizing another, but that’s what happened after the investigation of a 2008 motor coach crash in which 17 people from Texas died en route to a southwest Missouri music festival.

The National Transportation Safety Board, which looks into crashes and recommends safety improvements, recently admonished the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for doing too little on motor coach safety.

The well-placed criticism must lead to changes. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, whose job is to issue manufacturing safety standards for highway vehicles, should move quickly to implement improvements.

Motor coaches are generally considered safe, but crashes can involve significant loss of life because of the absence of safety belts and because the roofs sometimes open up under stress, resulting in passenger ejections. Johnson County now uses motor coaches on its popular K-10 express route.

After looking into the Texas crash, the safety board Chairwoman Deborah Hersman said she felt as if “we’re pounding our heads against the wall. We have not seen one iota of change with respect to the crashworthiness for motor coaches.”

The only response has been a statement from the traffic safety administration that soon it will propose a requirement for motor-coach seatbelt installation, and it will do more to reduce driver fatigue and inattention.

Unfortunately, not mentioned was the issue of roof strength standards, which safety officials say should be improved to provide more passenger protection in rollovers. Certainly, new vehicle manufacturers should incorporate safer roofs.

Posted on Wed, Nov. 04, 2009 10:15 PM

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