Are School Buses Safe? What 10 Years of NHTSA Data Show

Quick answer: 1,069 people were killed in school-bus-related crashes in the United States between 2015 and 2024 — an average of 107 a year, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The surprise in the data: the bus itself is rarely where the danger is. Seven in ten of those killed were occupants of other vehicles, and more pedestrians died (162) than school-bus occupants (119).

The numbers: 962 crashes, 1,069 deaths

NHTSA's National Center for Statistics and Analysis reports that from 2015 to 2024 there were 962 fatal school-bus-related crashes in the US, killing 1,069 people — about 107 a year. The figures cover every fatal crash involving a school bus or a vehicle used as one, not only crashes in which children died.

The timing is no accident: 19–23 October 2026 is National School Bus Safety Week, NHTSA's annual push to remind drivers and families about the risks around the school bus.

Children: 204 deaths — mostly not on the bus

Of the 1,069 people killed, 204 were school-age children aged 18 or younger. Fewer than one in five of them died inside a school bus:

• 39 were occupants of school buses
• 78 were occupants of other vehicles
• 77 were pedestrians
• 7 were bicyclists
• 3 were other non-occupants

A child caught up in a school-bus-related crash is more likely to die as a pedestrian near the bus — or in another car — than as a passenger on it.

The danger is outside the bus

Across all ages, 162 pedestrians were killed in school-bus-related crashes from 2015 to 2024 — almost 1.5 times the 119 school-bus occupants killed (49 drivers and 70 passengers). And most deaths of all — 70% — were occupants of other vehicles involved in the crashes.

School buses are, statistically, the safest way to transport schoolchildren: the vehicles are built to protect the passengers inside. The risk concentrates at the kerb — while children board, get off, and cross the street around the bus. That is where attention matters most.

Stop-arm violators: 63 deaths in 25 years

One specific and preventable danger is drivers who illegally pass a stopped school bus. From 2000 to 2024, 63 people died in crashes involving a driver illegally passing a stopped school bus — an average of 2.5 a year. Almost half of those killed (27) were pedestrians aged 18 or younger. When a school bus stops and its red lights flash, passing it is illegal in every US state.

Why the bus protects its passengers

NHTSA calls school buses "statistically the safest way to transport school children", and the design explains why. A school bus is large and heavy, painted a distinctive yellow, and fitted with flashing red lights, a stop arm and a crossing control arm — all engineered to be seen and to keep other traffic away. Inside, closely spaced, high-backed seats are designed to cushion passengers in a crash. The 119 school-bus occupants killed over ten years — against the millions of children who ride every school day — is the measure of how well that protection works.

What Safety Week involves

National School Bus Safety Week runs from 19 to 23 October 2026. NHTSA marks it with public messaging materials for the week: facts and statistics from its National Center for Statistics and Analysis, talking points written separately for drivers, parents and students, and sample news releases that local organisations can adapt. The core message does not change year to year — the stop arm means stop — because the deaths it aims to prevent have not stopped either.

What drivers can do this week

NHTSA's safety-week message to motorists is straightforward: slow down around school buses, stop when the red lights flash, and watch for children at bus stops — especially on the darker mornings of late October. For live reports from US roads today, see today's accident map; national US figures by state are on the US accident statistics page, and worldwide numbers are on the world accident statistics page.

How these numbers were counted

The figures come from NHTSA's National Center for Statistics and Analysis, published on the agency's Traffic Safety Marketing school-bus safety page. "School-bus-related crashes" means fatal crashes involving a school bus or a vehicle functioning as one; the main window covers the ten full years 2015–2024, and the illegal-passing figures cover 2000–2024. The numbers count people killed in crashes, not crashes alone — a single crash can kill occupants of several vehicles as well as pedestrians.