How safe are your kids on the bus?

We always scour the internet and newspapers for the latest stories of accidents, so that we can use them as cautionary tales for all of you. Our hope is that by talking about these topics, we'll be able to prevent more tragedy from happening in the future by informing and educating people. Worst case scenario, you'll at least know exactly what to do after an accident to get your life back on track as quickly as possible.

Every now and then, there's an oddity in the news that catches our attention and makes us ask "really?" That's how we felt this morning, as two stories from different parts of the country came in about accidents involving school buses. In Texas, a bus driver failed to yield and hit a car, sending himself and two other children to the hospital. At almost the same time, in Connecticut, a bus was rear-ended by a car that didn't see the bus slowing down in time. In this case, no one was seriously hurt. (Which makes sense, as you'd need to be driving pretty fast to rear-end a bus hard enough to hurt anyone.)

It was unusual to see two bus accidents at once, so we took the liberty of looking up vehicle accident statistics from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Their data shows that from 2004 to 2013, drivers in the U.S. were involved in 340,039 fatal motor vehicle traffic crashes. Of those, 1,214 (.4%), were classified as "school-transportation-related," involving a school bus or some other vehicle taking children to or from school.

In fact, statistically, your children become significantly safer the moment they step on that bus. While there are sadly about 6 fatalities a year from children on school buses, the fatality rate in a normal car is much higher for everyone.

So while today was a strange day with simultaneous accidents, you can rest easy knowing that your children are as safe as possible when they're riding the bus.

That said, if anything ever does happen, you know that we're here for you. All you need to do to get in touch with us is give us a call at (866) 587-4320, send us an e-mail at info@simiafunding.com, or submit a short application right here. Whenever you need us, we'll be ready.