Highway Patrol: 8 die in California tour bus crash

Authorities work the scene where at least eight people were killed and nearly two dozen were injured when a bus carrying a group from Tijuana, Mexico crashed with two other vehicles on its way back from Big Bear Lake on Highway 38 north of Yucaipa, Calif., Sunday, Feb. 3, 2013. Both sides of the highway remained closed two and a half hours after the crash and it was unclear when it would reopen. (AP Photo/The Sun, Rick Sforza)

YUCAIPA, California— A tour bus crashed with a pickup truck on a rural mountain highway in Southern California, killing eight people and injuring dozens of others, authorities said.

The collision happened around 6:30 p.m. Sunday and included the tour bus, a pickup truck pulling a trailer, and a sedan, said California Highway Patrol Officer Mario Lopez. He confirmed late Sunday that eight people died and many more were injured in the mountain highway crash about 80 miles east of Los Angeles near the town of Forest Falls.

Fire Department spokesman Eric Sherwin said 27 people were treated at the scene. He said injuries varied from minor to life-threatening.

People were being extricated from the bus more than an hour after the crash on a mountainous stretch of two-lane Highway 38, and rescuers were still searching the wreckage for victims hours later. Television footage showed the bus sitting upright but turned sideways on the road.

Sherwin did not know where the bus was headed or how the truck was involved. Highway 38 leads to Big Bear, a popular area that’s home to a ski resort and other recreational locations.

At least seven ambulances were called to the scene, and patients were taken to several hospitals.

The injured were rushed to several area hospitals.

Arrowhead Regional Medical Center said four women had been admitted from the crash and their conditions were still being determined. Redland Community Hospital said it received one person in critical condition and one with minor injuries, while two more were en route with minor injuries. Community Hospital of San Bernardino said it had received one patient with undetermined injuries, while St. Bernadine Medical Center said it had two patients, whose injuries were being assessed.

The California crash comes less than a day after a bus carrying 42 high school students and their chaperones slammed into an overpass in Boston. Massachusetts state police said 35 people were injured and that the driver had directed the bus onto a road with a height limit.