An RTD bus was severely damaged Tuesday afternoon and several passengers were injured when a pickup collided with the bus and caused it to smash into a large light pole, Denver police said.
Denver police spokesman Sonny Jackson said the bus was northbound on Sheridan Boulevard and the pickup was southbound shortly after 2 p.m.
Jackson said the pickup abruptly turned left in front of the bus at West Sixth Avenue, hitting the bus and causing it to strike the pole. Jackson said the light was green and the Route 51 bus had the right of way because there was no left-turn signal. The pickup driver was cited, he said.
Five people — two children and three adults, including the bus driver — were taken to a local hospital, Jackson said. There were several people who refused treatment or were examined by fire medics at the scene.
Stella Martinez, 34, a bus passenger, said she was on her way home from a doctor’s appointment and saw a white pickup pull into the path of the bus.
“I thought, ‘Oh, my God, the bus is going to flip,’ ” she said.
Martinez said the impact of the collision threw her to the floor. When she got up, she said, “everybody on the bus was screaming.”
Cassandra Usera, a college student who frequently takes the bus, said she was not paying much attention to the road when “all of a sudden there was a crash.”
“People flew this way and people flew that way,” Usera said.
She said that immediately after the accident she was in shock. She said she saw a woman with a bloodied mouth.
After speaking to reporters, she became dizzy and had to sit down. Minutes later, an ambulance arrived and Usera was taken to a hospital.
Over the course of just four days earlier this month, RTD buses were involved in three accidents that killed four people.
