Thunder Bay school bus officials say no safety changes needed, a month after student nearly run over

A month after a near-miss almost resulted in a student being hit by a school bus he was riding in Thunder Bay, Ont., officials aren't making any changes.

The child's mother, however, believes more can be done to improve child safety.

On Dec. 13, mother of three Melanie Pelletier shared security camera footage on social media that appeared to show a school bus driver nearly hit her son Colt, a junior kindergarten student, as he was crossing the road after getting off the bus. The driver was suspended the next day.

Pelletier's two school-age children attend St. Jude School. Immediately after the incident, she said she would like to see an adult bus monitor ride with the children aboard the bus.

"I'm hoping that there would actually be another adult on board that's able to just attend to the children that are on the bus ... [so] the bus driver is able to focus on the road and when the children are actually getting off the bus."

CBC News reconnected with her on Monday to see what, if anything, has happened at her children's school since the incident.

After a series of school bus cancellations due to driver shortages following the winter break, Pelletier's children now ride a new school bus with a new driver, she said. There have been no issues since then, but she still believes a bus monitor would be beneficial.

She also said having buses with motion sensors and a front camera would help improve safety, "especially with such a big blind spot."

When CBC News reached out to the Thunder Bay Catholic District School Board (TBCDSB) and St. Jude School for comment, the board's communications officer directed the reporter to Student Transportation Services of Thunder Bay, which is the transportation consortium for the city's three school boards. 

Craig Murphy is the consortium's manager. When asked whether December's incident sparked any changes, Murphy said: "No, I think our system is very thorough.

"It's unfortunate, but when you have an employer or a company that has employees that are working on their own, unsupervised, you can provide all the training you possibly can, and do everything and check every box to make sure that everything has been covered.

"But if that driver decides for whatever reason to ignore it all and do something incredibly unsafe, I'm not sure there's anything that could be done to predict that," said Murphy.

He also confirmed the investigation into the driver's behaviour was completed the day after the incident.

"When we got notified the afternoon that it happened, I contacted the bus company to remove the driver pending an investigation by the bus company, and that investigation was completed by the first thing the next morning."