Another passenger of the doomed discount bus that crashed in the Bronx has died, bringing the death toll in the horrific highway wreck to 15, police said Monday.
The fifteenth victim, a 70-year-old man, died of his injuries shortly after 7 a.m.
A police source confirmed to the Daily News that a fifteenth victim died, but could not provide further details. None of the victims have been identified.
Federal agents probing the cause of the Bronx crash were poring over the coach’s “black box” and onboard videotape Sunday night.
Investigators said the black box will reveal if the driver, Ophadell Williams, was speeding, and video should indicate if he fell asleep at the wheel – or support his initial claim he was sideswiped by a big rig.
A truck driver contacted state police Sunday, but claimed he was behind the bus, not alongside it, and saw it weaving and then swerve off southbound lanes of Interstate 95.
Christopher Hart, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said the truck driver’s rig was impounded and was being inspected for damage.
The tractor-trailer showed no visible signs of colliding with the bus, but it has to be checked more closely and taken apart, a police source said.
Hart said the bus’ onboard camera was pointed at the passengers, but investigators will probably be able to determine if the driver lost control after falling asleep or was bumped.
Surviving passengers told police that Williams, 40, of Brooklyn, had dozed off several times, waking up after hitting the roadway rumble strip, right before the bus careened out of control.
Williams, who passed a Breathalyzer test, arrived at the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Conn., about 11 p.m. on Friday and took a nap in the parking lot, casino staffers told the state police. A Mohegan Sun staffer woke him up about 3 a.m. on Saturday to take the ill-fated group back to Manhattan, a source said.
The 1999 World Wide Travel bus left the casino at 3:45 a.m. and was headed to Chinatown when tragedy struck at 5:35 a.m. as most of the 31 passengers slept.
The bus slammed into a guardrail, toppled on its side near the Hutchinson Parkway exit ramp and skidded 480 feet into a freeway signpost that acted like a can opener and sheared off most of the roof.
Nine men and six women, most of them Chinese-Americans, were killed, while 13 were injured, five of them critically.
Hart said NTSB investigators had interviewed two passengers but had yet to speak to Williams, who was released from the hospital last night after being treated for scrapes and a neck injury.
