Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — Hayden School District had a bus involved in an accident for the second time in a week Friday when one of its buses slid off a Moffat County road and went down an embankment. No one was hurt.

Colorado State Patrol Sgt. James Copley said the bus driver, Charles Girton, 62, apparently lost control of the vehicle because the gravel roads he was driving on were wet and muddy.

Copley said the bus driver had just picked up two middle-school students and was driving west on Moffat County Road 28 near Elkhead Reservoir when he crested a hill and the vehicle began to fishtail and slide out of control.

The bus spun, went off the right side of the road and slid down an embankment.

It came to rest on its wheels about 50 feet from the road, Copley said.

There were no other vehicles involved in the accident.

Copley said it had rained hea--vily the night before the accident, making the gravel roads extremely muddy.

Girton was not ticketed.

The accident was the second accident in a week for Hayden school buses.

The first accident occurred Sept. 6 on U.S. Highway 40 when a white Ford pickup hit a bus, disabling its left-side stop sign and lights.

The driver of the truck left the scene of the accident, continuing west on U.S. 40.

No one was injured in that accident. The Colorado State Patrol still is investigating the accident and asks anyone with information to call the State Patrol office in Craig at 824-6501.

-- To reach Alexis DeLaCruz, call 871-4234 or e-mail adelacruz@steamboatpilot.com