Bus company has had 36 injury crashes in Tennessee since 2014

The private company that owned the bus involved in Monday's wreck in Chattanooga that killed five elementary school students has had 142 crashes with injuries and three fatalities in the past 24 months, according to federal records.

Records show at least 36 crashes with injuries and one wreck with a fatality in Tennessee during that span, including two crashes with injuries in Hamilton County this year.

The Chattanooga Police Department also confirmed the driver of the bus in Monday's crash, 24-year-old Johnthony Walker, was involved in a school bus accident in September.

Durham School Services, based in Warrenville, Ill., has more than 13,000 vehicles and 13,000 drivers, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. The company has contracts to operate school buses in several counties in Tennessee, including Shelby and Hamilton.

Among the incidents:

• On Feb. 2, a 59-year-old driver working for Durham in Hamilton County was cited after the bus he was operating was involved in a crash on Fourth Avenue in Chattanooga, according to administration records. The records show one person was injured. 
• On Feb. 11, two people were injured after a 57-year-old Durham bus driver got in a wreck on Fike Drive in East Ridge, another community in Hamilton County. 
• On Sept. 7, a person was killed in Shelby County after the car she was driving hit the side of a Durham bus, according to The Commercial Appeal. The bus driver in the case was cited for a failure to yield left turn resulting in death.

Durham is a large company, and it has an overall satisfactory safety rating from the federal administration, but it still has more problems when it comes to driver fitness than its peers, the records show. The administration's records on Durham state "93% of motor carriers in the same safety event group have better on-road performance than this motor carrier."

A safety event group includes other similar bus and truck companies.

In the past 24 months, Durham has been involved in 346 crashes, 201 of which were towaway wrecks. That data was last updated in late October.

In Tennessee, the company has been involved in crashes in three counties, according to federal statistics.

In Shelby County, there were 31 injuries and one fatality as a result of 27 crashes involving the company. In Hamilton County, there were five injuries in six crashes. In Warren County, there was one crash and no reported injuries.

Walker has been charged with five counts of vehicular homicide. In 2014, he had his license suspended after a crash, according to the Tennessee Department of Safety.

There have been eight driver violations against Durham since December 2014, according to the administration. Although none of those drivers were in Tennessee, seven of the incidents involved drivers who didn't have the appropriate license needed to operate the vehicles they were driving.

In Hamilton County, there were no bus crash fatalities from the 2011-12 school year through the 2014-15 school year, according to state records. Statewide, there were between zero and two fatalities each year.

Tuesday morning Durham School Services CEO David A. Duke issued a statement calling the crash a tragedy.

"Our entire team at Durham School Services is devastated by the accident yesterday that tragically claimed the lives of Chattanooga students. We are working with Chattanooga Police Department and Hamilton County School District to investigate. We also have additional team members arriving in Chattanooga today to provide support. We have offered to provide counseling to students and families of Hamilton County, as well as our employees. We will provide all further updates in coordination with the Chattanooga Police Department and the district," Duke said.

The Durham website, which includes Duke's statement on the homepage, says employees must meet "stringent selection criteria, which includes an extensive interview process, background checks and drug testing."

This isn't the first time Durham has had issues in Tennessee.

A 2014 investigation by the Commercial Appeal found that Durham drivers had wrecked 32 buses in one school year in Shelby County. Records showed that Durham could have prevented more than half of its accidents.

A similar investigation also found that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration hadn't conducted a "full comprehensive review" of the company since 2007. At the time, the company had operated in Shelby County for three years. The investigation states during that time Durham buses were involved in 251 accidents in Shelby County alone.

Reporter Joel Ebert contributed to this story. 

More Tennessee bus crash coverage

• Families begin to ID children killed in crash
• What we know: Fatal Chattanooga school bus crash
• Lawmaker: Tennessee needs seatbelt requirement for school buses
• Chattanooga mourns as investigation continues
• Superintendent: 5 children killed in Chattanooga school bus crash
• 23 hospitalized after I-65 school bus crash
• Police release 911 calls from Nashville bus crash
• First responder recounts Knoxville bus crash
• Two children, one adult killed in 2014 crash involving 2 school buses
• NTSB rules ‘risky behavior’ cause of fatal Knox bus crash
• Samuel L. Jackson, Butch Jones, musicians react to crash

Reach Dave Boucher at 615-259-8892 and on Twitter @Dave_Boucher1.