HOBBS, NEW MEXICO (AP) – The investigation into a recent fiery head-on crash in West Texas now focusses on the revelation that a 13-year-old was driving the pickup truck that struck a van, killing nine people, including six members of a college golf team and their coach.
The young teen, who is still unidentified, and a man travelling in the truck also died.
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg on Thursday revealed the truck was driven by the child. He said the truck’s left front tyre, which was a spare tyre, blew out before impact.
The pickup truck crossed into the opposite lane on the darkened, two-lane highway before colliding head-on with the van. Both vehicles burst into flames.
Although it was unclear how fast the two vehicles were travelling, “this was clearly a high-speed collision”, Landsberg said.
Landsberg said investigators hoped to retrieve enough information from the vehicle’s recorders, if they survived, to understand what happened. He said many in the van were not wearing seatbelts and at least one was ejected from the vehicle. It’s not unusual for young teens to drive in that region and other more rural parts of the United States.
But “that was dumb” for a 13-year-old to be driving on a busy two-lane roadway used by oil traffic, said Gib Stevens, who leads area trucking operations for an oilfield servicing company.
One must be 14 in Texas to start taking classroom courses for a learner’s licence and 15 to receive that provisional licence to drive with an instructor or licenced adult in the vehicle.
Department of Public Safety Sergeant Victor Taylor said a 13-year-old driving would be breaking the law.
The University of the Southwest students, including one from Portugal and one from Mexico, and the coach were returning from a golf tournament when the vehicles collided on Tuesday night.
Two Canadian students were hospitalised in critical condition.
The NTSB sent an investigative team to the crash site in Texas’ Andrews County, about 50 kilometres east of the New Mexico state line.
