Multiple burn injuries reported in Hearst Castle tour bus leak
Multiple people suffered burn injuries Saturday after an apparent leak from a ruptured radiator line sent hot fluid from a rear engine pouring through a Hearst Castle tour bus.
According to the emergency app PulsePoint, several units responded to the visitor center for a multi-casualty incident reported at 2:38 p.m.
State Parks supervising ranger Sgt. Sean Lia said a total of 20 people were on the bus at the time on the road that connects the visitor center to the Castle. All of them were adults, and nine passengers incurred some injuries to their lower extremities.
All the injuries were deemed to be minor, he said of what he called a highly unusual event. Lia said he had never heard of a similar accident happening at the Castle.
Lia said Castle rangers, all of whom are medics, arrived about 2:35 p.m. to find that “the bus driver had, according to protocol, evacuated the passengers. They were standing or sitting by the side of the road, some with their shoes and socks off.”
They had assembled “on a curve in the flats, before the cattle guard,” Lia said of the location.
“We immediately assessed the nine injured parties and began treatment,” he said, actions which were continued soon thereafter by arriving firefighters and medics from other agencies.
Donald Sandbrook, a tourist from New Zealand who was one of the passengers on the bus, told The Tribune that the bus was driving up the hill when a hot, reddish fluid started pouring down the floor, burning the feet and legs of several passengers.
“We were in the back of the bus, the back row of seats,” Sandbrook said. “We were about halfway up the hill (almost to the top). All of a sudden, one of my daughters, seated near the window, started screaming. (She) lifted her legs, and my next daughter did the same. I looked down and gallons of red liquid (were) pouring in and what looked like smoke. We thought the bus had a fire.”
Eventually those passengers who wanted to continue with their visits and tours were taken via another bus to the hilltop, and the injured people likewise were taken to the visitor center for further evaluation and treatment.
Lia said all the injuries were deemed to be minor, but that one passenger was transported to an area hospital “strictly as a precaution.” The ranger didn’t know which hospital received the patient, or what the outcome was.
Apparently, he said, a mechanical failure of some sort had sent the hot, leaking antifreeze from the rear engine of the bus.
As of about 5:45 p.m., other details were still sketchy, according to Lia and Dan Falat, superintendent of the state park district that includes Hearst Castle and its hilltop compound.
“We’re still investigating the nature of the failure and what it resulted in,” Lia said. “We can’t answer exactly yet how this occurred.” State Parks is in charge of the investigation.
Lia said “I want to reiterate that this is an isolated incident and that people don’t need to be concerned about their safety in the buses. We’re trying to get to the bottom of how and why this happened.”
This story was originally published October 22, 2022 at 4:29 PM.
