Deadly bus tragedy prompts transport safety debate

The bus fire tragedy that claimed the lives of 20 students and three teachers and left several injured on Tuesday has sparked a debate on whether education trips for students should be banned altogether. However, some argue that field trips remain an important part of students’ learning process while addressing concerns that public bus safety must be a priority.
After the accident, Education Minister Permpoon Chidchob ordered students’ field trips to be suspended.
If such trips are necessary, buses arranged for the trips must undergo safety inspections from provincial land transport offices on a case-by-case basis, the minister said, adding that field trips must be categorised according to students’ age.
Younger pupils may have to be accompanied by their parents on the trip, while long-distance inter-provincial trips may have to be avoided.
However, Pol Gen Permpoon insisted education trips are still essential for learning while banning them altogether will be a hindrance. He also stressed the need for a road accident response drill so passengers can be equipped with the knowledge of how to escape and survive an accident.
The victims on Tuesday were killed by a fire that raced through their bus in Pathum Thani while they were out on a field trip.
The bus was carrying 39 students, from Kindergarten 2 to Mathayom 3, and six teachers from Wat Khao Praya Sangkharam school in Lan Sak district of Uthai Thani, which is about 250 kilometres away from the site of the accident.
The bus caught on fire on an inbound lane of Vibhavadi Rangsit Road, near the Zeer Rangsit shopping centre in Pathum Thani’s Lam Luk Ka district.
The vehicle, belonging to Sing Buri-based Chinnaboot Tour, was the second of a three-bus fleet taking students to an exhibition at the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand office in Bang Kruai district in Nonthaburi. They had earlier visited History Park in Ayutthaya. It was a one-day education trip.
The bus driver, identified as Samarn Chanphut, 48, fled the scene before surrendering to police on Tuesday night. His licence has been suspended, and he faces losing his licence permanently if found responsible.
The inspection of the ill-fated bus by forensic police concluded that a gas leak was the cause of the tragedy.
The bus had 11 tanks containing compressed natural gas (CNG), and a fuel line, which carries gas from a tank to the engine, had come loose, causing the leak. Six of the 11 CNG tanks installed on the bus were registered, while the remaining tanks were not.
There was no evidence of a front tyre explosion, as previously reported, but the front-wheel shaft was broken and showed signs of having scraped against the road surface.
It has not yet been determined what caused the sparks that ignited the flames or why the gas was leaking.
The Department of Land Transport said it will inspect all 13,426 vehicles using CNG nationwide within 60 days.
Safety concerns
Thanapong Jinvong, director of the Road Safety Group of Thailand, told the Bangkok Post that one of the survivors said the fire broke out at the front of the bus and it took less than one minute before the blaze engulfed the vehicle. This means the passengers had little time to escape, he said.
“The question is why the fire raced through the bus so quickly. Is this because of the faulty gas system? Normally, there should be an automatic safety shut-off valve as a protection mechanism. Moreover, there was no report of gas tank explosion in this case,” he said.
“Another issue is the emergency door of the bus involved in the accident was stuck. If the door had functioned properly, more people should have survived,” Dr Thanapong said, adding there were no other staff on the bus to help extinguish the fire.
He added Thailand lacks a central agency that serves as a centre of knowledge and information on road safety for the government to formulate strategies, policies and enforcement measures, such as the Malaysian Institute of Road Safety Research in Malaysia.
“We lack a specific and independent agency that specialises in gathering information and finding the cause of the fire to present solutions in a systematic manner to the government and inform the public,” he said.
“We only have specialists working at separate agencies. Sometimes, they cannot speak out about errors or flaws at their agencies.”
For short-term measures, vehicles arranged for field trips must be inspected more rigorously by state agencies before the trips while public transport agencies should compile lists of bus companies that meet safety standards for schools to choose from.
“We also have to discuss whether education trips are still necessary. Do [young] pupils have to take a trip across provinces? I agreed that we should categorise field trips for various age groups of school children,” he said.
He went on to say that most Thais still lack knowledge about how to respond to and survive road accidents. “A study conducted by our group shows that a road safety class for Thai students made up less than one hour of the whole semester,” he said.
He also suggested that a bus hired for a school trip should also have another staff member on board, in addition to the driver. In case of an emergency, the staff member can use an extinguisher to put out a fire and open the emergency door, he said.
Public safety bill push
Suchatvee Suwansawat, a former president of the Engineering Institute of Thailand (EIT), said he plans to table a bill on public safety to parliament for consideration. The bill will be submitted on behalf of the civil sector and requires the support of at least 10,000 people.
To date, about 1,000 signatures have been collected in support of the bill, said Mr Suchatvee, who also serves as a deputy leader of the Democrat Party.
He said the bus fire tragedy is expected to raise public awareness of the importance of road safety and he hopes more people will sign of the bill.
“If the bill is passed by parliament and becomes law, a committee on public safety will be set up and report directly to the prime minister.
“The committee will comprise representatives of the Council of Engineers, the EIT, academics, professional councils and the public,” he said.
The committee will serve as a central agency which will send officials and experts on issues related to road accidents and disasters to work with police and rescue workers on the field.
“They will offer their knowledge and gather evidence and information which will be used to formulate strategies, and action plans and will then present reports to parliament.
“The committee will also receive complaints from the general public,” he said. “If the bill is enacted, it will boost efforts to rescue victims and prevent accents more systematically with the assistance of specialists.”
A ban is no solution
Kanyawan Samranpanich, a mother of two students attending a Bangkok school, said that she disagrees with any attempt to ban educational trips.
These trips provide students with an opportunity to explore, engage, learn new things and have fun in an environment different from their everyday classrooms, she said.
“Banning educational trips is not a solution. The trips are not the problem, but it is about enforcing safety measures.
“The public bus must meet safety standards. But many buses have been illegally modified,” she said.
She said that young pupils should only be allowed to take short-distance trips within their home provinces or to nearby provinces, rather than long-distance ones.
Road accident response drills must be held regularly for teachers and students while public buses must always be inspected to ensure safety, she said.
Adisak Plitponkarnpim, director of the National Institute for Child and Family Department at Mahidol University, echoed the view that a ban on educational trips will not solve the problem.
“What we should do is to address concerns about public bus safety. The laws are there, but the problem is [lack of] enforcement,” he said.
He also said the Department of Land Transport should revise the rules on the granting of public bus driving licences by checking drivers’ records and holding training courses on bus safety.
Losses could be minimised if a bus driver is well-trained on how to cope with emergency cases, he said.
He added that agencies should inspect locally-made double-deckers, which are widely used to transport foreign tourists, to ensure they meet safety standards.
Noppadon Pattama, a Pheu Thai Party list MP, also called on the government to enforce strict compliance with the laws on traffic and public buses.
He said that exceeding speed limits is another major cause of road accidents so the government should issue a legal requirement for public buses to be fitted with speed-limiting technology to ensure they do not exceed mandatory speed limits.
Double-deckers should also no longer be allowed to operate as it is hard for passengers to escape if an accident arises, he added.
Sophon Zarum, chairman of the House committee on education, said educational trips are not the cause of the bus fire tragedy, but those involved in arranging the bus and providing the service must take the blame for failing to comply with safety rules.
The government must also speed up help and compensation for the injured and families of the deceased in the accident, he added.