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Feds Shut Down Lucky Star Bus Due To Safety Hazards, Giant Holes
By
Lauren Evans
Published Jun 7, 2013
Modified Jun 7, 2013
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By
Lauren Evans
Published Jun 7, 2013
Modified Jun 7, 2013
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Another discount bus operator has bitten the dust. Only a scant few months after the feds shut down Fung Wah bus line for posing an "imminent hazard" to riders, competitor Lucky Star, which shuttled passengers between NYC and Boston, is facing the same fate.
Like Fung Wah, a report from the Department of Transportation declares that passengers who ride Lucky Star face a serious risk of serious injury or death. What sort of risk, you ask? Oh, nothing major, just a hole in the bottom of one bus large enough to swallow a child. See below for some enjoyable bedtime reading, courtesy of the DOT [Full PDF here]:
Lucky Star fails to ensure that its motor coaches are systematically and properly inspected, repaired and maintained and meet minimum safety standards; indeed, Lucky Star, through the actions of Qiao M. Chen, dispatched a motor coach that had an approximate 4 foot by 2 foot hole in the bottom of the motor coach and significant frame damage.
Inspections on May 10, 2013 and May 21, 2013 resulted in four out of six motor coaches owned by Lucky Star being placed out of service and a total of 69 vehicle defects discovered. Lucky Star has an ineffective inspection repair and maintenance program because the company is unable to keep up with the inspection, repair and maintenance with the near around-the-clock dispatch-schedule it maintains.
Investigators discovered that Lucky Star’s motor coaches broke down on 80 separate occasions between New York City and Boston from May 5, 2012 through May 22, 2013. These break downs over a period of one year, involved over 10 of Lucky Star’s 21 motor coaches, some of them simultaneously. For example, on December 27, 2012, three of Lucky Star’s motor coaches broke down and on February 17, 2013, two broke down. These break downs caused passengers to have to disembark along the highway and at unscheduled stop areas. Lucky Star’s inadequate maintenance program substantially increases the risk of serious injury or death and is an imminently hazardous and potentially deadly situation for Lucky Star’s drivers, passengers and the motoring public.
Lucky Star fails to monitor and ensure that its drivers comply with drivers’ hours of service requirements, drivers’ records of duty requirements, and drivers’ controlled substances and alcohol use and testing requirements. Lucky Star has no system for monitoring and tracking drivers’ hours of service and does not require its drivers to complete records of duty status. Lucky Star fails to test drivers for controlled substances before allowing them to perform safety-sensitive functions.
OK cool. But what is a stray hole or two when the livelihood of Misaki Japanese Seafood Buffet Restaurant in Central Manchester, Connecticut is on the line! The Save the Lucky Star Facebook page, which as of this writing has racked up a total nine "likes," beseeches fans to help save the hole-filled bus line—not for their sake, but for the Buffet Restaurant.
"The elimination of the Lucky Star will not only inconvenience hundreds of daily travelers, but also may put the Central Manchester, CT restaurant "Misaki" out of business. We won't stand for it!," reads one of two posts on the page. (The first is an entreaty to "join the cause help support affordable and efficient" service.)
Any mention of bus-holes is conspicuously absent from the Facebook page.
Tagged
child-sized holes
chinatown bus
lucky star
Lauren Evans
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