Fleet Owner in Canada Bus Crash Fined for Safety Violations

The owner of a trucking company who’s driver caused a fatal bus crash in Saskatchewan, Canada, has plead guilty to five charges related to his company’s history of skirting federal safety regulations.

Sukhmander Singh, owner of the trucking company Adesh Deol Trucking pleaded guilty to charges that allege that his company failed to keep a daily drivers log, had more than one daily log book and had no formal safety program in place, according to a report in GlobalNews.ca. The company also failed to ensure that its drivers were complying with safety regulations.

These violations were all recorded in the four months leading up to the April 6 crash. Adesh Deol Trucking is no longer in business, according to GlobalNews.ca. For pleading guilty, Singh was fined $5,000 and has until the end of next year to pay it.

The collision between a commercial truck and a motor coach carrying the Humboldt Broncos junior ice hockey team resulted in 16 deaths and 13 injuries.  The truck driver responsible for the crash, Jaskirat Singh, was recently sentenced to eight years in prison and will be deported to India after serving his term.

The crash occurred when the 30-year old driver ran a stop sign at 50 m.p.h. and t-boned the bus, as it passed through the intersection. While his negligence was criminal, his training for the job was reportedly severely lacking.

He had only been a driver for three weeks prior to the crash, and at the time of the accident was worried about the billowing tarps on his load of peat moss bales. In the few weeks prior to the crash, his logbook and vehicle inspection reports contained 70 violations, mostly technical in nature. He received his CDL only the year prior and had received two weeks of training with an experienced driver. The accident occurred during his first week on his own.

Read more about the details of case here.