Driver in Church Bus Crash Admitted Texting Before Collision
Authorities investigating a deadly crash learned that the driver of the pickup truck that killed a group of senior church members in northern Uvalde County, rural Texas on March 29 was texting. The accident highlighted the danger of being on the phone while behind the wheel.
This development was first learned by a concerned driver who responded to the accident. Jody Kuchler, 55, a self-employed welder said he and his girlfriend were driving behind the Dodge Dually pickup truck before the accident and saw it recklessly swerving across the lanes at 80 miles an hour.
"We noticed he started drifting off the side of the road and he got in the grass and then he came back up on the road," he told Kens5. "He kept going off the road and over into incoming traffic. There was a couple of cars and trucks that actually got off on the shoulder."
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Kuchler's girlfriend recorded the scene while he called the sheriff's offices for both Uvalde and Real Counties.
"He's going to hit somebody head on or he's going to kill his own d*mn self. Somebody needs to get this guy off the road," he warned the dispatchers.
They kept recording for 20 minutes and by the time they stopped, the truck plowed into a minibus that killed 13 people, including its driver. My San Antonio identified the truck driver as Jack Dillon Young, 20, a former football player at Leakey High School who had no previous criminal history.
Kuchler checked on the passengers of both vehicles and asked Young if he realized what he did. "The only thing he said to me is, 'I'm sorry, I was texting,' and he asked for help." He was airlifted to University Hospital in San Antonio where he was declared in stable condition.
The church vehicle is a 2004 Ford E-350 series van that had been converted into a minibus, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. Only one passenger survived, identified as Rose Mary Harris, 64. The group came from a retreat and were heading back to First Baptist Church in New Braunfels when the accident happened.
