The Kempsey bus crash killed 35 people and injured 41 on the Pacific Highway near

Kempsey, New South Wales Kempsey is a town in the Mid North Coast region of New South Wales, Australia and is the council seat for Kempsey Shire. It is located roughly 16.5 kilometres inland from the coast of the Pacific Ocean, on the Macleay Valley Way near where the P ...

on 22 December 1989 when a

McCafferty's Coaches McCafferty's Coaches was an Australian family run interstate coach operator from 1940 to 2004. In October 2004 the McCafferty family sold its shares and its operations were rebranded as part of Greyhound Australia History McCafferty's Coaches ...

coach Coach may refer to: Guidance/instruction * Coach (sport), a director of Athletes' training and activities * Coaching, the practice of guiding an individual through a process ** Acting coach, a teacher who trains performers Transportation * Coac ...

operating an express service from

Brisbane Brisbane ( ; ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and largest city of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia, with a ...

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

collided head on with a Trans City Express coach operating an express service from Sydney to Brisbane. It remains the worst road crash in Australia.

Crash

The impact snapped seats from their anchor bolts. Seats and passengers were thrown forward in the vehicles with a terrific amount of force, which also trapped people and their luggage against the fronts of the buses. The force of the impact left the

-bound coach, operated by

, embedded in the front five rows of the cabin of the

-bound coach, operated by Trans City Express. The crash triggered a major emergency response as

police The police are Law enforcement organization, a constituted body of Law enforcement officer, people empowered by a State (polity), state with the aim of Law enforcement, enforcing the law and protecting the Public order policing, public order ...

State Emergency Service The State Emergency Service (SES) is the name used by a number of separate civil defence organisations in Australia that provide assistance during and after major incidents. Specifically, the services deal with floods, storms and tsunamis, b ...

and volunteer rescuers, firefighters and paramedics attended the crash. A fleet of

air ambulance Air medical services are the use of aircraft, including both fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters to provide various kinds of urgent medical care, especially prehospital, emergency and critical care to patients during aeromedical evacuation an ...

s and helicopters carried the injured to hospitals at Kempsey,

Port Macquarie Port Macquarie, sometimes shortened to Port Mac and commonly locally nicknamed Port, is a coastal city on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, Australia, north of Sydney, and south of Brisbane, on the Tasman Sea coast at the mouth of the ...

Coffs Harbour Coffs Harbour, locally nicknamed Coffs, is a coastal city on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, Australia, north of Sydney, and south of Brisbane. It is one of the largest urban centres on the North Coast, with a population of 78,759 a ...

and Sydney. A New South Wales Coroner's inquiry into the collision found that the driver of the McCafferty's coach fell asleep at the wheel. This caused his vehicle to travel straight on through a left-hand curve on the highway and collide with the Trans City Express coach. There was no indication that the driver had applied his brakes or dimmed the headlights, the coroner found. Neither coach was speeding at the time of the crash, and no mechanical faults were found in either vehicle.

Coronial inquest and aftermath

The coroner (Kevin Waller) endorsed the recommendation he made following the Grafton bus crash two months earlier, that the Pacific Highway be upgraded to dual carriageway between

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England, United Kingdom *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England, United Kingdom *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area ...

and the

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

border. The New South Wales and Commonwealth governments committed to carry out the required work, with an initial promised completion date of 2006. This target never came close to being met; at July 2008, only 267 kilometres (or 39%) of the route had been upgraded to dual carriageway standard, with 87 kilometres of divided road under construction and 325 kilometres of the highway still a single carriageway. As of May 2016, following a sustained upgrade program, 437 kilometres (65%) of the highway between

Hexham Hexham ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, on the south bank of the River Tyne, formed by the confluence of the North Tyne and the South Tyne at Warden nearby, and close to Hadrian's Wall. Hexham was the administra ...

and the Queensland border was dual carriageway (either at freeway or arterial road standards), with 240 kilometres of single carriageway remaining to be upgraded. The final section was completed in December 2020, bringing an end to the project after 24 years. The coroner also recommended research into coach seats, seat anchorages and seatbelts. Better emergency exits for coaches were also recommended, as rescuers were hindered in their initial efforts to enter the wreckage by the positioning of the exits 2.4m from the ground. Following the collision and despite the extensive damage incurred, both coaches were rebuilt by Denning, being completed in June 1990 and allocated body numbers 1378 (Trans City Express – original body 1238) and 1379 (McCafferty's – original body 1335). After the demise of Trans City Express in March 1992, much of its fleet was sold off and McCafferty's was among the purchasers, buying three coaches including the one involved in the crash. Both of the rebuilt coaches remained in service with McCafferty's for more than a decade. The McCafferty's coach from the Kempsey crash was involved in another crash exactly 14 years later, in the early hours of 22 December 2003. On this occasion the coach was travelling south towards

Rockhampton Rockhampton is a city in the Rockhampton Region of Central Queensland, Australia. In the , the population of Rockhampton was 79,293. A common nickname for Rockhampton is "Rocky", and the demonym of Rockhampton is Rockhamptonite. The Scottish- ...

on the

Bruce Highway The Bruce Highway is a major highway in Queensland, Australia. Commencing in the state capital, Brisbane, it passes through areas close to the eastern coast on its way to Cairns in Far North Queensland. The route is part of the Australian Natio ...

when it was involved in a head-on collision with a truck. On this occasion there were no fatalities, with six people suffering minor injuries. However, the coach was damaged beyond economic repair and was written off. This collision and the Grafton bus crash eight weeks earlier were described as "arguably Australia’s most catastrophic examples of high consequence/low probability incidents in the bus industry" in a bus safety discussion document. The section of the Pacific Highway where the collision occurred was bypassed in May 2016 by a dual carriageway as part of the upgrades recommended by the coronerDeadly stretch of Pacific Highway to be bypassed today, 27 years after bus crash
''

ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...

'' 16 May 2016 and is now named Macleay Valley Way.

References

News video of accident

National Nine News – Nightline clip

Mention on Emergency Management Australia website

"Pacific Highway Upgrade"
– NSW Parliament mention in

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official printe ...

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