Sometimes it takes what’s happening across the border to make us see the light. Last week, a 15-passenger van crashed in Nova Scotia, Canada killing 8 people, including students of Halifax Grammar School and a teacher returning home from a game in the middle of a snowstorm.

15-passenger vans have been under the spotlight for years now but the magnitude of this tragedy must make us reexamine our own position with respect to this vehicle. Consumer rights and traffic safety experts have long spoken out against the dangers posed by these vehicles. The changing center of gravity in the van makes it difficult to handle in emergency situations. The risk shoots up five times when a van is fully loaded with 15 passengers, as opposed to when it has just one driver, especially when the van is going at 50 miles an hour or navigating turns. Not only that, the vans are structurally ill-built. Seat belts, for instance, on 15-passenger vans fit poorly. In 2004, the National Transportation Safety Board recommended that schools using the vans to transport more than 10 children make structural changes to their vans, including adjusting the seat belts.

Since the eighties, more than a thousand people have been killed in these 15-passenger van accidents. In the US, some schools have been prohibited from using these to transport students to outings, field trips and games.

California however has chosen to outline safety precaution for the use of the vans. In 2004 California passed a law requiring all vehicles originally designed as 15-passenger vans to be driven only by drivers with a commercial driver’s license and an endorsement for passenger transportation. This applies even to those vans that have been modified to seat 10 passengers.

As the Nova Scotia accident shows, the ability of a driver could be sorely tested with fatal consequences where 15-passenger vans are concerned. A vehicle that has been confirmed to have severe structural deficiencies, which cause them to roll over, should not be used for transporting children. Safety measures don’t mean much during times of bad weather or other emergency situations. It’s time for California to outright ban these vehicles.

We don’t have to wait for a Halifax Grammar School-type tragedy to strike at home before we take action to protect our kids.

If you or a loved-one has been injured or killed in a 15-passenger van rollover, you need the help of an experienced California personal injury lawyer. Contact an attorney at The Reeves Law Group for a free consultation.