Thomas MacMillan Photos
An officer headed to a disturbance at the train station Monday morning smashed into a CT Transit bus near the Green, sending 24 people to the hospital, according to police.
The crash took place at 11:05 a.m. at the corner of Temple and Elm streets, according to police. Police had received a call about a fight involving a disturbed person at Union Station.
Workers inspect the base of a light pole taken out by the bus.
Officer Victor Herrera responded to the call. He was driving his police cruiser eastbound on Elm Street, into the intersection with Temple, when his car when it collided with a J bus, which was heading south on Temple.
The cruiser slammed into a stone bollard and was totaled. The bus “flew,” according to one passenger, onto the grass of the Lower Green, into a lamppost, shattering its window. The driver of a second cruiser passed through the same intersection without incident en route to Union Station.
It was the second time in just over three months that a cop car has crashed into a stone post, at the same intersection.
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The bus had 26 passengers on it at the time of the crash, according to Mayor John DeStefano. Twelve had already been taken to the hospital as of 11:45; another 11 were waiting for ambulances. Four passengers refused medical care.
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Officer Herrera was in the worst shape. The fire department had to use hydraulic tools to extricate the officer from the car because the door would not open. The airbag deployed in the police cruiser, and the officer may have lost and then regained consciousness, according to Police Chief Dean Esserman.
“Thank God the airbag deployed,” Esserman said. (Esserman reported later Monday afternoon that Herrera was released from the hospital without serious injury.)
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Esserman, DeStefano and Grant brief the press at the scene.
“We’re all extremely grateful no one has been killed,” DeStefano said at a press conference at the scene. He said the bus’s passengers included children. “The children were shaken up,” he said.
Staff from the Yale Child Study Center were brought to the scene to help the children, Esserman said.
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The bus driver, who’s female, was able to walk to the ambulance, and at first glance her injury did not appear to be serious, Esserman said.
The chief said the investigation is in very preliminary stages, and it’s too early to know who’s at fault. Officer Herrera, who is in his 19th year on the police force, had his siren on at the time of the crash, according to Esserman.
When the bus hit a pole, it exposed live wires. A United Illuminated crew came and deactivated the lines.
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Lt. Jeff Hoffman and top downtown cop Sgt. Tammi Means coordinate police response at the scene.
The Green was swarming with dozens of police officers and fire personnel, both taking care of the victims and collecting evidence.
Michael Hill (pictured) watched the scene unfold from feet away as he handed out flyers for Family Dentistry of Derby. “All I seen is the cop car shooting this way,” he said, motioning to the east. “It just smashed right into the side of the bus.”
“A cop came out. The bus driver struggled to get around him. Both of them hit each other,” said Jessica Brendle, an 18-year-old woman who was riding the J Bus home to New Haven from Waterbury. She said no one yelled on the bus at the time of the crash.
Two bikes had been attached to a rack at the front of the bus. One fell off. The other, an F.S. Elite, was crumpled beyond repair.