8 Kids, 1 Adult Hurt In Crash On Dan Ryan
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Eight children and an adult were taken to hospitals Wednesday morning, after a daycare van, a Megabus, and two cars were involved in a crash on the Dan Ryan Expressway.
Officials said a daycare school bus, a Megabus headed to Michigan, and two cars collided around 7:15 a.m. in the southbound lanes of the Dan Ryan near the entrance ramp at 51st Street.
Eight children and an adult who were in the daycare van were taken to hospitals. Three children were taken to St. Bernard Hospital, three kids were taken to Mercy Hospital and Medical Center, and two children were taken to Comer Children's Hospital. The adult was taken to St. Bernard.
Tim King was driving one of the cars involved.
"My car fishtailed from one end to the next end, and it hit the median. When we hit the median, it ricocheted off the median, and hit the daycare van, and then hit the gray car," Tim King said.
King said he wasn't even aware a Megabus was also involved in the crash until he came to a stop. No one on the bus was hurt, and all 28 passengers boarded another Megabus later Wednesday morning.
Illinois State Police said the weather might have been a factor in the crash. Roads were slippery and falling snow was hampering visibility at the time of the crash.
"I guess it was just the road. You know, it was no salt down or anything. I was going maybe 25, 30 miles an hour," King said.
The slick conditions made driving dangerous throughout the morning commute. Two hours earlier, trucker Dominick Albright lost control of his step truck on the Dan Ryan near the Garfield exit.
"All of a sudden, my truck hit a patch of ice, and I hit the middle median, and I bounced back and hit the Garfield ramp exit wall," he said. "My life flashed before my eyes."
He luckily avoided hitting any other vehicles.
Plows had a hard time keeping up with the snow because of the heavy traffic, which was bumper-to-bumper at times on many local expressways.
At one point this morning, the estimated drive time on the Kennedy Expressway from O'Hare to Downtown was three hours.
