Driver of Houston ISD school bus hits, kills cyclist at Heights intersection

Police investigate a scene where a cyclist was struck and killed by a HISD school bus at Heights Blvd. and 8th Street in the Heights, Thursday, March 7, 2019. Police investigate a scene where a cyclist was struck and killed by a HISD school bus at Heights Blvd. and 8th Street in the Heights, Thursday, March 7, 2019. Photo: Mark Mulligan/Houston Chronicle Photo: Mark Mulligan/Houston Chronicle Image 1 of / 12 Caption Close Driver of Houston ISD school bus hits, kills cyclist at Heights intersection 1 / 12 Back to Gallery

The driver of a Houston ISD bus hit and killed a bicyclist who inadvertently slid under the vehicle Thursday afternoon while trying to avoid a collision in the Heights.

The rear wheels of the yellow school bus ran over the male cyclist and killed him almost instantly around 3 p.m., according to witnesses and police. The impact knocked the cyclist’s one-speed ride to his side in the intersection of East 8th Street and Heights Boulevard.

Ronny Smeink was shopping for antiques across the street from the crash and heard screams.

"I thought somebody was looking for their dog,” Smeink said. “I looked up and saw somebody on the ground."

The shopper ran across the boulevard to help the cyclist and called 911 as another man tried to get the rider’s backpack off him. Smeink checked for a pulse and felt nothing.

“There was no sign of life,” Smeink said.

A blood-soaked sheet later covered the cyclist as police investigated the crash.

The cyclist was peddling north in a bike lane along the boulevard and appeared to have the right away as the bus stopped at a stop sign on East 8th, Houston Police Department Lt. Thurston Roberson said at a press conference. The bus driver continued through the intersection and went in front of the bicyclist and hit him, Roberson said.

One child was on board the bus and going home at the time of the fatal crash, Houston ISD officials said in a statement. The unidentified driver was completing the afternoon route from an unspecified school.

The driver and student were not injured.

The unidentified bicyclist was believed to be in his early 20s, Roberson said. A wallet could be seen lying on top of his back pack.

The driver remained on the bus with umbrellas and sheets covering the windshield for at least three hours as police interviewed her and investigated the crash. Three of her relatives who came to the scene within an hour of the crash declined to comment.

“She’s fine,” said one of the relatives.

A grand jury will later determine if the driver will face charges in the fatal wreck.

A camera on the bus was running at the time of the crash and investigators are reviewing it frame-by-frame to determine what happened and who was at fault.

The school district said its transportation services is cooperating with the police investigation.

A woman walking her dog at an apartment complex adjacent to the crash site mournfully looked at the cyclist’s body.

“It’s not my child, but I feel so bad for whose ever he is,” she said, without providing her name.

Also gathered on the sidewalk Thursday evening was 25-year-old Hayden Eckhardt, who used to be an avid bicyclist in the Heights.

“I don’t any more because of (expletive) like this,” Eckardt said, pointing to the cyclist’s body in the street. “It’s scary to be a bicyclist in Houston, Texas.”

His fear is not unfounded. Local drivers have mowed down nearly 2,000 pedestrians and cyclists in the past 16 years. From 2001 to 2016, 235 of them were cyclists killed on greater Houston roadways.

Eckardt’s friend, Andrew Hemingway, 29, said he was nearly hit Thursday afternoon by a vehicle using a nearby bike lane to pass him.

jay.jordan@chron.com

nicole.hensley@chron.com