Deadly crash junction to be altered
Grieving Bronco dad says plan for safety improvements ‘good step’
Scott Thomas was at the site of the crash that killed his son and 15 other members of the Humboldt Broncos organization on April 6.
He has been back to the scene several times since and says it was always “pretty obvious” that changes were needed to improve safety at the intersection of highways 35 and 335.
One of the greatest tragedies experienced in the province, Thomas said the crash was a multitude of “bad things that came together” at one precise moment.
So when the provincial government on Wednesday announced it would make several changes to the intersection based on a recent safety review, Thomas called it a “good step” that came with a “mixture of relief” and a “little bit of resignation.”
“You can never guarantee accidents will never happen,” he said. “But all of these things are working in the direction of making things safer, especially at that intersection.”
The government said trees near the deadly intersection will be removed, signage will be improved, rumble strips will be added and the memorial to the victims will be relocated.
Those moves are included in the 13 recommendations made by Mcelhanney Consulting Services Ltd., the company commissioned to investigate the fatal crash.
The crash happened when the Broncos team bus, northbound to Nipawin on Highway 35, collided with a semi that was westbound on Highway 335.
Sixteen people on the team bus, including Thomas’ son Evan, died as a result, and 13 more were injured.
Highway 335 has stop signs with flashing warning lights at the intersection with 35, but the report recommends the province install “stop” and “stop ahead” pavement messages to improve safety. The relative cost-benefit of doing so was listed as “high” by the Mcelhanney investigators.
Ministry of Highway crews were already installing the pavement markings Wednesday afternoon and planned to paint a solid centre line on highways 35 and 335 on Thursday if weather permits.
The report also recommended removing trees on the southeast corner of the intersection. Those trees, located on private property, prompted concerns that they could obscure sight lines for vehicles travelling along Highway 35.
“We haven’t had any formal discussions with (the property owners) about the recommendations in the report,” said Fred Antunes, deputy minister of highways, noting the ministry has a relationship with the owners and they were informed the report was being released and removing the trees was one of the recommendations.
The report also concludes a memorial to the crash victims, currently located in the northwest corner of the intersection, should be relocated to a safer location in the future. Antunes said the government’s next steps will be to contact the City of Humboldt and the Broncos organization to discuss “planning and implementing a safe access to a permanent memorial.”
He said the current access to the memorial location is a “little close to the intersection,” so if the memorial stays in the same place, the access will move to a different location.
Humboldt Broncos president Jamie Brockman said there were more action items in the report than he anticipated.
“I’m very satisfied overall. The government has determined that whatever came out of this report, they were going to do. We’re looking forward to working with them in the very short future to start addressing some of these things, and we’ll do what we can to work with them,” he said.
The government also paved the east and west approaches on Highway 335 this summer and plans to add milled rumble strips, even though the report found the cost of doing so “would be higher than usual as the approaches would need to be paved in order to provide a deep enough surface to mill. Consideration would also have to be given to the noise it would generate in close proximity to a residence in the southeast corner.”
There is an expectation each of the recommendations will be followed through by the end of 2019.
One source of calls for rumble strips was the Rural Municipality of Connaught.
Coun. Dale Poggemiller said he was impressed by the comprehensiveness of the recommendations in the report, which was based in part on consultations with the RM.
Poggemiller said he believes rumble strips will be the single most effective way to prevent serious collisions at the intersection, though all of the recommendations make sense provided drivers obey the rules.
“There is a lot of intersections that are very dangerous. They definitely need to look at (more) intersections in the province — check them, they need to make sure they’re all safe.”
To implement all 13 recommendations will cost around $1 million, according to the province.
Investigators reviewed geometric, collision and traffic data for the site and observed human characteristics at the intersection to “identify any deficiencies or potential safety issues that could be increasing the risk (frequency and severity) of collisions at the intersection and to recommend mitigation strategies to reduce these risks.”
They found that the frequency of collisions at the intersection is low, but the severity of those collisions is high: 50 per cent of them result in injury, while 17 per cent result in death.
“Although there have been two multiple fatality collisions at the intersection, the location does not have a high overall frequency of collisions, including high severity collisions. No significant collision trends were identified at the intersection,” reads one portion of the report.
On June 17, 1997, a family of six was killed at the same highway intersection.