Police said Wednesday that they planned to ticket a driver who lost control of her school bus and fell from the vehicle as she transported two North Chicago boys to classes in Mundelein.
Diana Wallace, 36, of Antioch, will be ticketed with failure to wear a safety belt in connection with a bizarre incident that occurred about 7:40 a.m. Monday on Illinois Highway 137 near the Tri-State Tollway, according to Lt. Fred Heidecke of the Lake County Sheriff’s Department. Heidecke said the ticket will be issued when Wallace recovers from injuries suffered in the accident.
Wallace was driving her 16-passenger school bus, with the two students on board, just east of the tollway overpass, when she began to cough uncontrollably, police said. The bus struck a guardrail, and Wallace, who allegedly was not wearing a seatbelt, was ejected from her seat and through the passenger loading door onto the roadway. She tumbled and slid some 50 feet before coming to rest against a curb.
The two students on the bus, 11 and 9, jumped from the bus just before it rolled across three lanes of rush-hour traffic and down an embankment, police said.
The boys were treated at Provena-St. Therese Medical Center in Waukegan and released, authorities said.
Wallace was in stable condition Wednesday at Condell Medical Center in Libertyville, an official said.
Heidecke said that toxicology tests indicate that neither drugs nor alcohol were a factor.
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