Seat belts have been mandatory in cars for more than 40 years, so why aren’t school buses equipped the same way? According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, it’s because school buses don’t need seat belts to be safe. The bulkiness of a bus makes it about seven times safer than a passenger car. In the event of a collision, a bus can easily absorb the force of impact. Plus, kids riding in buses are doubly protected because the seats are designed to cushion children almost like eggs in a carton. The accommodations might not provide much legroom for unruly 8-year-olds, but the high seatbacks and heavy padding work to form a protective cocoon around them. If Junior is thrown forward in a crash, he won’t get far before the cushy seatback absorbs his momentum.
Of course, none of this will help if the bus flips over. But the chances of that are so slim that most state legislators don’t think seat belts are worth the added expense. Still, some states would rather be safe than sorry. New York and California, for example, now require all new school buses to come equipped with lap-and-shoulder belts.
Comments (10)
Comment
- subscribe /
- give a gift /
- terms of service /
- about /
- contact us /
- write for us /
- ad info /
- subscriber services /
- press /
- privacy policy /
- rss /
© 2012 Mental Floss Inc. All Rights Reserved. Mental Floss is a registered trademark owned by Felix Dennis. mentalfloss.com is a trademark owned by Felix Dennis.
Disclaimer: All submissions made to mental_floss become the property of Mental Floss Inc and may be used without further permission by the submitter and without compensation to the submitter. If you do not agree to these terms, please do not submit anything to mental_floss.
PLUS – The kids wouldn’t use them anyway. Some would be more likely to use them to hit their fellow students, than to ‘buckle-up’.
posted by SlackJack on 3-30-2009 at 10:06 am
The expense of re-fitting school buses with seat belts is huge, not to mention the nuisance. You have to not only install them, but you have to make sure that the seat frames can take the sudden impact of someone being caught by a belt, and you have to make sure that the bolts fastening them to the floor can also take that strain, and you have to make sure that the floor can take it, too.
And SlackJack is right: the kids use them as weapons. Choking is very popular.
posted by Gus on 3-30-2009 at 10:26 am
I’m from NY, and I can say that the mandatory seatbelts did far more harm than good. I can’t remember a single time a student used them for safety purposes, but I CAN remember them being used as weapons in fights, serious or otherwise. Let me tell you, being whipped by a seatbelt is not fun.
posted by Meghan on 3-30-2009 at 11:30 am
I think that there’s also concern that in the event of a crash or fire, you may need to get the kids off the bus as quickly as possible, and a bus full of small children struggling with seatbelts while the bus is on fire could be disastrous.
posted by Craig on 3-30-2009 at 11:51 am
I agree with everything already said. But I also have a question.
Does *anyone* remember the seats being ‘cushy’? All I recall is being very aware of the metal rails at the top of the seat-backs.
posted by Laura. on 3-30-2009 at 3:53 pm
Like Meghan, I’m from NY and there ARE seat belts on the buses- but they’re used far more often for fights than for safety.
And cushioning seats? *Uggghhh*. They’re some of the most uncomfortable seats I remember…
posted by Sam on 3-30-2009 at 4:30 pm
I, too, question that ‘cushion them like eggs in a carton’. That metal bar would scramble an egg…
posted by Vickey on 3-30-2009 at 6:11 pm
I was actually in a school bus crash in junior high. We went around a curve, hit an ice patch, and slammed into a telephone pole going around 30 miles per hour. Besides a little bit of whiplash, no one was hurt. The seats actually did a good job of protecting us, from preschoolers to high schoolers, and we didn’t have seatbelts.
posted by janeeyre316 on 3-30-2009 at 6:17 pm
I am suprised my area has no forced us to put seatbelts on our buses. About 2 or 3 years ago my area was the site of a bus crash that killed quite a few high school students. I know they tried a few buses with belts at the elementary schools, but none ever got to our highschool.
posted by Michaela on 3-30-2009 at 10:17 pm
When I was in school, our buses had belts, but we were told specifically NOT to use them — too much hassle if they got stuck and the driver had to get us out.
posted by M on 3-31-2009 at 6:35 pm