Apr 22, 2007 3 min read

The Pennsylvania School Bus Association (PSBA) recently honored Jonetta Durigon of Smock as one of the commonwealth’s safest school bus drivers. The 24th annual Safe Driver awards program, sponsored by the association, was held March 31, in Harrisburg. Sixty-four drivers were recognized for their accident-free records of transporting children to and from school, as well as school-related activities, safely.

The drivers acknowledged have driven a minimum of five years of continuous accident-free busing, with one driver having more than 45 years. All the drivers have a combined safe driving record of more than 12 million miles.

In addition of PSBA’s award, Durigon was recognized by special guest speaker, Cpl. Robert Krol, supervisor of the Super Load and School Bus Safety Unit with the Pennsylvania State Police Bureau of Patrol. Krol oversees the annual school bus safety Inspections.

He commended the honorees for excelling in safe driving. “Nationally, their contribution has played a large part in school buses being rated the safest form of highway transportation. An impressive rating considering the fact that in the United States every school day, some 450,000 school buses transport more than 23 million children to and from school and school-related activities,’ Krol said.

“That’s like taking every resident of Florida, Massachusetts and Oregon for a ride in a school bus twice every day,” he added.

“Closer to home, Pennsylvania has approximately 25,000 school buses traveling over 346 million miles of Commonwealth highways, carrying over 1.5 million of our school children,” Krol said.

“According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, nationally during the year 2004, there were 691,000 motor vehicle crashes that occurred between the hours of 6 and 9 a.m. Monday through Friday. Between the hours of 3 and 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, there were 1,230,000 motor vehicle crashes nationally during 2004. Combined, those figures tell us that 1,921,000 crashes occurred in 2004 during the time period and days of the week that school buses are about the business of transportation of our nation’s school children,’ Krol said. “During these morning and afternoon three-hour increments, nearly one third of all motor vehicle crashes nationwide occurred on Saturdays and Sundays. This really emphasizes the point that driving a school bus is not an easy job.”

Durigon has been employed by Rittenhouse Bus Lines Inc. for the past six years and has driven more than 55,000 miles without having an accident. Other drivers recognized by Rittenhouse Bus Lines Inc. in the past for safe driver award have been: Charles Yocum, Victor Vesely, Lewanda Yocum, James Rittenhouse, David Rittenhouse, Wanda Stewart, Janice Teck, Mary Jo Porter, Dolores Leasure, George Soverns, Tom McGill, Joanne Kieta, Mary Rosinski and Robert Shuff.