Maranoa businesses band together to sort new bus to take students to school days after horror head-on crash

In a true show of community spirit, Maranoa businesses banded together to ensure Wallumbilla State School students were able to get to school with a new bus just days after a horror highway head-on.

LOCAL LEGENDS: Lor-Ken Transit’s Renee and Rodney Waugh along with driver Julie Klein (not pictured) have stepped in to help do the Yuleba to Wallumbilla State School bus run just days after a horrific crash on the Warrego Highway. PHOTO: Georgie Adams

In the face of an enormous tragedy that left one mother-of-five dead, another woman fighting for her life and a school bus full of children and their heroic driver injured, the southwest community has banded together in a show of true community spirit.

When Lor-Ken Transit owners Renee and Rodney Waugh heard on Friday, May 14 that one of their fellow local school bus drivers, Colin Stafford, had a car slam head-on into the bus he was driving along the Warrego Highway near Wallumbilla during the afternoon school run, they knew they had to do something.

Despite being a separate business from Mr Stafford’s, Mr and Mrs Waugh spent their weekend sorting one of their spare buses and drivers, Julie Klein, to cover the school route and ensure by Monday that the children of Yuleba were able to get to and from Wallumbilla State School.

Trying to downplay their generosity, Mrs Waugh said anyone else would have done the same.

“That’s just what small communities do – we’re there for each other in the dark times,” she said.

“God knows how long it would have taken to get a school bus to replace Colin’s, we’ve got a spare one so we thought we could help.

“When you’re in this sort of business your mind goes to what’s going to happen on Monday morning, we got to get the kids back in their routine.”

“To get a bus ready to school run doesn’t happen overnight.”

But the Waughs were able to do it in a weekend.

The couple spoke to Colin on Saturday to reassure him they were willing to cover his route while he recovered.

With the help of Roma-based business Crawfo’s Tyres and Mr Waugh doing the mechanical work, on Monday the spare bus was able to collect the children and the parents who opted to ride along for the first trip to school since the horror crash.

“I’ve done nothing out of the ordinary, getting my spare bus to him,” Mrs Waugh said.

Mrs Waugh joined the chorus of praise for Mr Stafford, who has been hailed as a hero for his driving skills that are believed to have saved the lives of the students on the bus. 

Tragically the passenger in the other car, a Chinchilla mother-of-five, was killed in the crash and the 37-year-old Western Downs driver was left fighting for her life in a Brisbane hospital.