Photos shared at inquest chart bus's tragic course
Warning: This story contains disturbing images
Only about eight seconds passed from the moment OC Transpo Bus 8155 left the Transitway roadway approaching Westboro station to the time it slammed into the canopy of a passenger shelter.
But that fleeting moment in January 2019 continues to have deep ramifications to this day.
Three passengers seated on the bus's top right deck, Judy Booth, Bruce Thomlinson and Anja Van Beek, died as a result of the collision, while many other people were injured, triggering a flurry of lawsuits and a trial against the bus driver that ended in her acquittal.
On Wednesday, a coroner's inquest seeking to prevent similar tragedies began with the painful statements of mourning families, before turning to the details of the crash.
Inquest lawyers read out a description of the event, stopping at times to show photos that help paint a picture of the bus's tragic course and the crash's destructive imprint.
As the inquest resumes on Friday and is expected to continue for weeks, here's a collection of those photos and diagrams, along with some new or added details uncovered by the inquest.
Speed cited in previous collision
The bus involved in the Jan. 11, 2019, Westboro crash was a packed double-decker, one of 133 double-deckers in OC Transpo's fleet at the time. Ottawa began using them in 2012, though the city now plans to pare back their use significantly by the year 2036.
Bus 8155 was on Route 269, an east-west corridor that ends in Kanata, with Aissatou Diallo at the wheel.
Diallo had been working for OC Transpo for about six months and had 55 hours experience operating a double-decker before the Westboro crash. She'd also operated an articulated bus, including during the morning of the day of the crash.
One month before, Diallo was involved in another, albeit far less serious collision, when her articulated bus hit a parked bus at St. Laurent station. According to an exhibit shared Wednesday during the inquest, "operator error and failure to adjust speed to road conditions" were the root cause of that collision.
Diallo took refresher training that involved an instructor watching her operate a bus with passengers and no major issues were cited, though her instructor reminded her to use the accelerator a bit less for better control of the bus, the inquest heard.
Diallo was cleared to return to work five days before the Westboro crash.
While the union for OC Transpo employees is taking part in the inquest, it's unclear if Diallo will testify.
Road markings
In the hour before the Westboro collision, 33 westbound buses travelled through the Transitway without incident.
Route 269 did not stop at Westboro during afternoons, but Diallo's 2021 trial heard from her defence team that she was responding to a stop request for Westboro station.
According to the inquest, however, that passenger was seeking to get off further west at Bayshore.
At about 3:50 p.m., the bus entered the widened two-lane portion of the westbound lane, moving to the right lane closest to the curb and entering the 50-kilometres-an-hour speed zone, which starts approximately 125 metres from the station.
About 69 metres from the station, the bus left the roadway at a speed of between 58 and 60 kilometres an hour. It then hit two snowbanks, the Transitway's rock wall and, finally, the passenger shelter's steel canopy.
Transport Canada found the bus was travelling between 36 and 40 kilometres an hour when it struck the shelter canopy, while an expert in mechanical engineering and specializing in road vehicle safety is expected to testify it was travelling between 27 and 53 km an hour.
A minute-by-minute breakdown of the speeds according to vehicle data has also been submitted into the inquest record.
The judge in Diallo's case, citing factors such as road markings that Diallo's defence team said were confusing, found her not guilty of dangerous driving causing death.
The judge wrote in his reasons for decision that while Diallo was driving "somewhat over" the recommended speed, "the manner and speed at which the merge occurred, up until the moment the bus left the paved surface, was not dangerous."
One photo, taken four days after the crash and shared during the inquest, shows the orange road markings in question. They had been painted in the summer of 2018 to redirect traffic during temporary lane closures. But by the time of the crash, they had become visible again because their replacement black paint had worn off.
No city employees had complained about them, the inquest heard.
Range of injuries
The first nine rows of the bus's right-side seats were severely damaged in the crash. Booth, Thomlinson and Van Beek were all seated in the first five rows
Thomlinson was in the window seat in Row 1 (seat 1540 in the below diagram showing the full range of injuries on the upper deck). Booth was in the window seat in row three (seat 1740), while Van Beek was in the window seat in row 5 (seat 1940).
Two people were thrown from their seats, according to the diagram.
Several people at the rear of the top deck suffered no injuries.
Four pillars on the ride side of the bus' interior structure failed because of the impact. The bus had passed an annual vehicle safety inspection in August 2018.
The crash happened about 50 minutes before sunset, with Diallo's trial lawyers pointing to sun glare as a factor.
"A transit operator in a bus behind Bus 8155 indicated that the sun was not an issue," the inquest heard.
Diallo has never operated an OC Transpo Bus since the day of the Westboro crash.
The inquest is not meant to impart legal blame, but rather empower a jury of five civilians to hear testimony from more than a dozen witnesses and make recommendations aimed at preventing similar deaths in the future.
Jurors are expected to hear from the inquest's first witness on Friday.
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