THE JURY in a trial arising from the Navan school bus crash three years ago in which five schoolgirls died has been told that there was a failure to repair the vehicle’s braking system, even though those responsible knew it was defective.
At the opening of the trial yesterday Brendan Grehan SC, prosecuting, told the jury that gardaí and the Health and Safety Authority carried out an investigation into the crash outside Navan in which Lisa Callan, Claire McCluskey, Amy McCabe, Deirdre Scanlon and Sinéad Ledwidge were killed on May 23rd, 2005.
He advised the jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court that it would not be concerned with the incident itself because the charges faced by two companies, Keltank in Balbriggan and McArdles Test Centre in Dundalk, concerned their responsiblities, which preceded the crash. Mr Grehan said it was the alleged offences under Section 7 and 8 of the Health and Safety at Work Act that would be the “focus of your deliberations”.
Sonya Kelly, company secretary, pleaded not guilty on behalf of Keltank to two charges of failing to undertake necessary maintenance and repair of the bus’s anti-lock braking system (ABS) on May 6th, 2005.
Joe McCardle, a director, has pleaded not guilty on behalf of McArdles Test Centre to two charges of failing to note the ABS warning light on the bus was not operational while conducting a vehicle test on March 15th, two months before the tragedy.
Mr Grehan (with Remy Farrell and Jonathan Kilfeather) told the jury it would be the State’s case that the system in place on the vehicle “significantly increased the severity of the accident” but he wanted to “make it clear” it was not the only factor that contributed to the collision.
He said Keltank was contracted by Bus Éireann to service and maintain the bus and there would be evidence Keltank staff were aware the system was not working but they failed to repair it. The vehicle had been tested at McArdles on March 4th to establish if it was roadworthy but it failed on a large number of points. It was returned to the test centre on March 15th, where it was retested and deemed roadworthy after it was noted that the previous problems had been corrected.
He said the students were killed instantly after they were thrown through the shattered windows of the bus after the vehicle veered into oncoming traffic, skidded into an embankment and overturned on to its side.
He told the jury there would be evidence that a bulb in a warning light, meant to alert the driver to the fact that the ABS was not working, had been removed and a computer system that recorded faults in the braking system had exceeded the maximum number of incidents (254) it had the capacity to record.
Mr Grehan said investigators found that the cables in the system had been corroded and tests suggested that they had been in this state for quite some time. He told the jury Bus Éireann had already pleaded guilty to offences under the Health and Safety Act in relation to the brakes. Mr Grehan said John Hubble (55), an experienced driver who had been working on the bus for eight or nine months, had “no instruction” in relation to the ABS on it.