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Work begins on fixing Bamfield Main, site of fatal UVic bus crash

Safety improvements have started on Bamfield Main, which was targeted for upgrades after a bus carrying UVic biology students on a field trip crashed in 2019, killing two teenagers. Huu-ay-aht First Nations Chief Councillor Robert Dennis Sr.
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Dodging potholes is common along Bamfield Main, the gravel logging road between Port Alberni and Bamfield.

Safety improvements have started on Bamfield Main, which was targeted for upgrades after a bus carrying UVic biology students on a field trip crashed in 2019, killing two teenagers.

Huu-ay-aht First Nations Chief Councillor Robert Dennis Sr., who lobbied for two decades for improvements, said having a funding agreement in place, with money in the bank, and technical work underway is a significant step and great news for his community.

For the mother of a student who died on that road, it’s a start.

“We think about her many times every day and Tuesday will be the same,” Ethel ­MacIntosh said of her daughter Emma ­MacIntosh Machado of Winnipeg, who would have turned 20 today.

Machado was one of two first-year students who died when a Wilson’s Transportation bus carrying 45 students and two teaching assistants tipped and crashed while on a biology field trip to Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre. John Geerdes, 18, from Iowa City, Iowa, was also killed in the night-time crash on Bamfield Main. Many other students were injured.

Safety improvements to the 76-kilometre logging road that connects Port Alberni and Bamfield, were cited as a priority by parents in an independent report into the crash by Ross Cloutier of Kamloops-based Bhudak Consultants Ltd., an expert in outdoor-related risk management, commissioned by the University of Victoria.

The report made 43 recommendations, three of which had been implemented as of September. “Significant progress has been made” since then, said Kristi Simpson, associate vice president financial planning and operations. The university will provide its next update on the recommendations this week.

MacIntosh, a surgeon specializing in ­oncology, said in a phone interview from ­Winnipeg, it’s difficult to say what recommendations take priority.

Road improvements will greatly benefit the Huu-ay-aht First Nations, workers and tourists and future students travelling that road, she said, and at the same time the university needs to improve the way it conducts field trips for the safety of all current and future students — “you couldn’t really say one is more important than the other.”

The funding agreement includes $25.7 million from the province and $5 million from the Huu-ay-aht, who will oversee construction. The work will include road widening where possible and required, new road drainage and culverts, road stabilization, signs, chip sealing and paving, said Dennis Sr.

Stabilizing the road sides in certain areas is one of the more significant jobs to be done, he said.

An RCMP report said the bus pulled over for an approaching Jeep, caught the soft edge of the road and slid down an embankment.

Dust from the gravel road can be blinding in the summer while winter rain can cause washouts.

“We’re anticipating chip sealing to probably start in June of this year,” said Dennis Sr., adding that’s an impressive timeline.

About 61 kilometres of the 76-kilometre road will be chip sealed and 15 kilometres paved, said Kevin Gordon, project manager for the Bamfield Main Safety Improvements Project.

Western Forest Products and Mosaic Forests, which own part of the road, are on board, said Dennis Sr., talking on his cellphone, something he couldn’t do prior to the bus crash. Reception in the area has been improved.

“It’s really rewarding to see a provincial government that is willing to look at people in communities that are on the lower end of the scale, because of their location, or because of their size,” said Dennis Sr. Regardless of the political party in power, Bamfield was never a priority for funding, he said.

B.C. Premier John Horgan, who pledged the funds last year, has lamented that everyone knew of the challenges of the road but it took the deaths of two students to focus efforts on fixing it.

MacIntosh is taking today off work to be with husband Jose Machado, on Emma’s birthday. Daughter Sam, 22, is at university in Halifax.

“These kinds of milestones are obviously more traumatizing to us,” said MacIntosh, adding there will be more difficult days ahead. “We still haven’t got the coroner’s report so we’re kind of waiting for that hammer to fall.”

MacIntosh hopes her family will be able to take Bamfield Main to the marine centre, which drew her daughter to study at UVic. The university has offered to fly the family out. Right now, it’s too early, MacIntosh said. “But someday I think we’ll steel ourselves to come out that way.”

ceharnett@timescolonist.com