It was an emotional return for parents of the hockey players involved in a bus crash west of Edmonton Sunday.
The players, all part of the South Side Athletic Club’s Lakewood Chevrolet Midget AA hockey team, returned Monday afternoon after a harrowing ordeal in which their charter bus rolled on the Yellowhead Highway near Hinton.
They were on their way to a game when the driver lost control of the bus, hit the ditch, causing the bus to roll over ending with the bus on it’s roof.
“We started sliding off into the ditch and one of the parents yelled hold on and it was just like is this really happening right now?” described 16 year old Joel McIsaac, “It was a lot to take in. It just happened really quickly.”
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27 people on board were treated in hospital. Most were released Sunday night, but one player, who is said to have suffered a broken tailbone, and the driver, who suffered serious injuries but is expected to survive, were held overnight.
“They are getting off the bus, they are actually, they are fortunate boys,” says Dorothy Heddle, the mother of one of the players.
This incident happened only weeks after a player with the SSAC’s other Midget AA team, 16 year old Kyle Fundytus, died after taking a puck to the neck.
“We know for sure he was looking over us… and that’s why all of us made it ok.”
“It’s tough,” admits Rob Fitzsimmons, “You just gotta stay strong. Our boys are with us, right, it’s nice to have all that support too.”
The team had a game scheduled Monday night, but that was cancelled.
“We’re just going to take some time and assess what happened,” says coach Chris Resler, “We don’t know all the injuries that happened with the boys. Everybody got pretty banged up so, hockey is not first on the priority list. It’s seeing who’s healthy and what we can do to make sure we’re all ready to go.”
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