On what was supposed to be a celebratory first day back to school, the Leander Independent School District community north of Austin, Texas, was shaken by a harrowing school bus crash that sent shockwaves through families, staff, and local officials. On August 13, 2025, at approximately 3:15 p.m., a 2024 Blue Bird school bus carrying 42 children from Bagdad Elementary School and their driver veered off Nameless Road—a winding, rural stretch notorious among residents for its sharp curves and lack of shoulders—and overturned in the Sandy Creek neighborhood.
According to the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS), the bus was traveling southbound when, for reasons still under investigation, it left the right side of the roadway on a curve and rolled over. As reported by the Associated Press, it was raining at the time, though it remains unclear whether weather contributed to the crash. Sgt. Billy Ray of DPS confirmed, “It is unclear if weather had a factor.”
Emergency responders quickly arrived at the scene, where video footage showed the yellow bus lying on its side, its roof damaged and several windows shattered. Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services confirmed that 17 people—15 students and the driver—were transported to local hospitals. Assistant Chief Kevin Parker stated during a news conference that at least one person had life-threatening injuries, while two others had injuries classified as potentially life-threatening. Despite the severity, all hospitalized individuals were later released and are now in stable condition, as confirmed by Leander ISD and local media outlets including FOX 7 Austin.
The crash’s timing—on the first day of the new school year—added to the trauma experienced by students and their families. For many, the excitement of returning to classrooms was replaced by fear and uncertainty. Leander ISD Superintendent Bruce Gearing expressed the district’s collective heartbreak, stating, “This tragedy is breaking our hearts. We want each of the students and their families to know that our prayers are with them. Our thoughts are with them. And we will do everything in our power to support them.”
In the aftermath, Leander ISD mobilized additional counselors and social workers at Bagdad Elementary to support students and staff, recognizing that recovery from such an incident is as much emotional as it is physical. The district also pledged to review its bus safety protocols to ensure all procedures were followed, emphasizing that student safety remains its top priority. “We are grateful to the first responders and staff who responded to the scene, as well as the outpouring of support from our #1LISD community,” the district said in a statement shared by multiple sources, including the American-Statesman.
The bus involved was a 2024 model equipped with lap/shoulder seatbelts, in compliance with Texas state law mandating three-point restraints on buses manufactured from 2018 onward. However, it remains unclear whether all students were wearing their seatbelts at the time of the crash. State law requires students to use these restraints, but enforcement and compliance are ongoing challenges, especially with younger students. Superintendent Gearing described the bus driver as a “seasoned veteran,” though further details about their experience and actions during the crash have not been released.
For many parents, the crash reignited longstanding concerns about Nameless Road’s safety. Steven Dacke, a local parent and resident for 28 years, told KVUE, “I hear sirens, automatically, my stomach usually sinks. And it’s usually in the same place that this accident happened with the bus. The roads have not really changed any, except for repaving. We need to have more patrols for speeding and people passing in [the] no passing zone.”
Some parents, like Vanessa Martinez, opted to pick up their children rather than risk another bus ride. “I don’t feel safe. Yeah, I’m scared for that road,” Martinez said. “And especially with everything going on, my two of my kids were so scared that they were like, 'Mom, please pick us up.' As far as right now, they’re not going to ride the bus. I don’t feel safe at all.”
County officials acknowledged the community’s concerns but said there are currently no plans to modify Nameless Road pending the outcome of the ongoing investigation. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), in coordination with Texas DPS, has opened a formal safety investigation into the crash. In a post on X, the NTSB announced, “The NTSB, in coordination with the Texas Department of Public Safety, has opened a safety investigation into Wednesday’s crash involving a school bus that departed the roadway and overturned in Leander, Texas.”
This incident is, unfortunately, not an isolated event for Leander ISD. According to the American-Statesman, the district has experienced at least five serious school bus crashes in the past seven years, including a 2024 incident in which a bus hit and injured a pedestrian and a 2018 crash where a driver ignored a barricade and drove into floodwaters, leading to a child endangerment conviction. Statewide, Texas recorded 2,480 school bus crashes in 2024 alone, resulting in 11 deaths and 93 serious injuries, according to data from the Texas Department of Public Safety and TxDOT. Over the past decade, nearly 31,000 school bus-related crashes have been documented across Texas.
The Sandy Creek neighborhood, where the August 13 crash occurred, had already been reeling from deadly flooding just a month earlier. The compounded trauma was not lost on district leaders. In a letter to families, Leander ISD wrote, “This part of our Leander ISD family has been through so much already this summer with the floods. The tragedy this afternoon is really breaking our hearts. We want each of those students and their families to know that our prayers are with them, our thoughts are with them, and we will do everything we can in our power to support them. And we will be here for all of those students who are affected, their friends, and their families.”
As the community awaits answers from the NTSB and DPS investigations, parents and officials alike are left grappling with difficult questions about rural road safety, seatbelt use, and the adequacy of current transportation policies. For now, the focus remains on healing, supporting the children and families affected, and ensuring that no one faces the aftermath alone.
While the cause of the crash remains undetermined, the incident has brought renewed urgency to calls for improved safety measures on Texas’s rural roads and in school transportation systems. The Leander ISD community, already resilient from recent hardships, faces yet another test—but, as officials and parents have stressed, they are committed to moving forward together, determined to make every ride to and from school as safe as possible.
