Inspections Find More Than 25% Of School Buses In Connecticut Unfit To Use - Courant.com

Inspections Find More Than 25% Of School Buses In Connecticut Unfit To Use - Courant.com
When a state inspector spotted a full-size school bus on the road with no brake lights, he ordered the Specialty Transportation Inc. vehicle back to the company's yard for a full examination.

Inside the gates, bus drivers were eager to see him.

"While in yard, several drivers approached me and advised that the company was not fixing defects," Sgt. Garfield Green wrote in his notes of the April 2008 inspection, in which he found 16 violations. "After inspecting the bus that I stopped, I can see where the concern may be valid."

A Courant analysis of nearly 30,000 school bus inspections in Connecticut magnifies that concern. Among larger school bus operators, Specialty had by far the worst maintenance record in the state in 2009, with inspectors declaring its buses unfit to carry students nearly seven out of 10 times. Specialty's buses on average had five times as many serious violations as buses statewide, and nearly 75 percent more on average than the large bus company with the second-worst record, Autumn Transportation, whose buses were taken off the road in six out of 10 inspections in 2009.

>> Click here to search inspections and violations for school buses in Connecticut.