Tour bus crashes on I-15 in storm; 19 are injured

Friday, Sept. 10, 2004 | 11:13 a.m.

A tour bus filled with visitors from Thailand slid off Interstate 15 on its way to Las Vegas Thursday during a widespread thunderstorm, injuring all on board.

The bus, traveling west of the state line, landed on its side, ejecting the driver and nine passengers.

One man was in critical condition and four other adults were in serious condition at University Medical Center Thursday night, UMC spokeswoman Cheryl Persinger said.

After passengers loaded onto the Lion Express-owned minibus in Cerritos, Calif., the tour group headed for Las Vegas. In the midst of the storm, the driver lost control of the bus, which went off the right side of the road and down a 15- to 20-foot embankment where it overturned, California Highway Patrol Sgt. Tim Smith said.

The most seriously injured had head trauma and broken bones, but none of the injuries were considered life-threatening, a spokeswoman for the San Bernardino County Fire Department said. The bus carried 18 passengers and the driver.

The Clark County Fire Department sent a heavy rescue unit and an emergency medical unit with a supervisor to the crash site, 10 miles south of the Nevada-California border, fire department Spokesman Bob Leinbach said.

Damien Morozumi, an attorney for the bus company based in Covina, Calif., said that the cause of the crash was under investigation, but it appeared to be storm related.

"There was a good deal of weather at the time," Morozumi said.

The storm was part of a system that moved across the region Thursday afternoon.

The Las Vegas Valley received from half an inch to three-quarters of an inch of rain as two broad bands of thunderstorms swept from the southwest across the valley, the National Weather Service reported.

Weather service forecasters put a severe thunderstorm warning in effect for the southern tip of Clark County, south of Las Vegas, and east along the Colorado River. The storms, brought with the seasonal monsoonal moisture, are expected to end tonight or early Saturday.

A flash flood watch and an urban small stream advisory was in effect from 2 p.m. until 8:15 p.m. on Thursday, National Weather Service meteorologist Brian Fuis said.

The official rainfall total at McCarran International Airport was 0.17 of an inch, but the Lower Duck Creek gauge near Patrick Lane in the southeast valley registered 0.71 of an inch.

Streets such as Nellis Boulevard at Lamb Boulevard also filled with runoff. A Regional Flood Control District gauge in the Las Vegas Wash at Lamb recorded 0.51 of an inch of rain.

North Las Vegas resident Aubrey McKinney, 36, stood in a gas station parking lot at the intersection of Charleston and Lamb boulevards at about 3 p.m. and stared at her gray Oldsmobile, which was stalled in the flooded street.

"It didn't look very deep, so I just drove through it," McKinney said. "But when traffic backed up, the car just broke down in the water. I tried to get it started back up, but it's just kaput."

The Charleston Underpass at Main Street and Charleston Boulevard remained clear throughout the storms.

Clark County Public Works spokesman Bobby Shelton said streets were closed because of flooding along Silverado Ranch from Las Vegas Boulevard South to Bermuda Road, Industrial Road at Cactus Drive, Sur Este at Spencer Street, Eldorado Lane and Spencer Street, and Topaz Street at Warm Springs Road.

A 4-square-mile swath of land bordered by Hualapai Way, Tropicana Avenue, Durango Boulevard and Sunset Road, once labeled a flood zone, had been officially removed from potential flood dangers and was not affected by Thursday's storm, said Steve Roberts of the Regional Flood Control District.

Cooler and drier air is expected to move into Southern Nevada over the weekend.

"We're nearing the end of the monsoon," Fuis said.

Ouflow winds from storms late Wednesday in Arizona and California, gusts and humid air fueled Thursday's storms.

"Everything came together just right," Fuis said.

Louis Katz, a native of Georgia, noticed how a sudden downpour can turn a parking lot into a lake. He was standing outside a shopping center at Eastern Avenue and Silverado Ranch Road when it flooded.

"I like the rain, but not this much rain all at once," Katz said.

A Target store in the area supplied umbrellas, rain ponchos and clerks to escort customers to their cars so they wouldn't get drenched, the store's guest service team leader, Stefhen Vance, said.

"The customers really appreciated it," Vance said.