Ricardo Cano

The Republic | azcentral.com

Chinle has more than $1 million to spend on new buses each year

Some routes take more than two hours each way

District buses failed more than 40 percent of safety inspections

CHINLE— Bus driver Keith John left home before sunrise on a Monday morning in April. A coat of dry mud remaining from the rainy weekend already lined the tires and wheel wells of the yellow school bus he keeps parked on his property overnight.

His first stop was at 5:30 a.m. to pick up a boy who lived past a winding dirt road on the far outskirts of the Navajo Reservation in the northeast corner of Arizona.

John drove on, his bus quaking along 40 miles of unpaved roads as he picked up student after student on their way to schools in Chinle.

Even when the roads were straight, John had to zigzag to keep the bus tires aligned on sturdier parts of the road and to avoid the deep ruts.

The trip would normally take less than an hour on paved roads. Instead, John's morning route stretched out to 2½ hours of driving.

More than 60 percent of routes cover unpaved roads in this sprawling school district of 4,200 square miles.

All that driving on rough, unpaved roads takes a major toll on the buses. It's the main reason the Chinle Unified School District spends $1 million a year on new buses.

But even with that much money, much of which is provided through federal assistance, the district has a tough time keeping its fleet of 74 buses from breaking down.

An investigation by The Arizona Republic found two out of every five of Chinle's bus inspections over the past three years resulted in failures for "major defects." Those buses all had to be taken off the road until the defects were fixed.

The district of 3,300 students failed 94 school bus inspections out of 231 from 2013 to 2015. That is a failure rate of almost 41 percent.

In comparison, the statewide failure rate over that period was 21 percent, The Republic's investigation found.

“Buses weren’t made to run on these roads,” said Quincy Natay, Chinle's school superintendent.

A common problem in rural Arizona

Buses in other rural school districts throughout Arizona experience the same kind of beating.

As a result, many rural Arizona districts — particularly in the Navajo and Fort Apache reservations, where there is higher elevation — had among the highest bus inspection failure rates in the state from 2013-15.

The fail rates ranged from more than 40 percent (Window Rock, Whiteriver and Pinon school districts) to 88 percent (Cedar Unified School District).

One bus in Chinle, the largest district on the Navajo Reservation, failed an inspection in 2014 for nine different major defects, according to records obtained by The Republic.

Defects on that bus, manufactured in 2005, included an inoperative stop sign arm, a heater hose exposed under a passenger seat, a cracked right front bumper and a missing engine latch.

“Exhaust fumes entering bus,” the failed inspection report read. “… Cracked rear upright bus body lid support structures. Prior welding (broken). Integrity of bus questionable.”

Natay said he was unaware of that specific failed inspection.

An internal document showed that bus had been active as recent as two days before its Oct. 29, 2014, inspection.

That bus was taken out of service by the district on Oct. 27, 2014, because it broke down. The district retired the bus that year, according to Lafey Tso, Chinle's transportation director.

Forty-two other Chinle school buses failed inspections that year.

Many obstacles for buses in Chinle

During the hottest weather, dust accumulates inside the engine compartments of Chinle's buses and can cause them to break down. The constant vibrations from driving on hard dirt roads can also loosen the screws and bolts that help hold a bus together.

After it rains, the clay becomes slick, sometimes making it impossible for buses to gain traction. They get stuck.

When that happens, children have to wait for school vans or parents to come pick them up. Bus drivers have to wait for the district's tow truck to pull them out.

Adding to the mechanical difficulties, the district in recent years has struggled to fill vacant driver positions.

The district has had bus driver vacancies since 2010. To fill the routes, mechanics have to get behind the wheel, taking away time spent repairing buses.

The district tries to offer mechanics as much overtime as it can to drive vacant routes, Natay said. But it still means less time for them to work on the buses.

Administrators and the district transportation department's secretary have also stepped in and driven routes.

Because Chinle is so remote, there is also a constant struggle to recruit people to work in the district, Natay said. Teachers and bus drivers are always in demand.

Natay said extreme rural districts like his will always have intensive operating and capital needs.

But the district has been “very fortunate to be in the financial position” it’s in, he said, speaking from his office near the Chinle bus yard.

A few hours after the interview, at the end of the school day, students boarded Keith John's bus for the ride home: a 2½-hour ride on bone-jarring unpaved roads. The route finished where it began — with the boy who lived past a winding dirt road.

After that, John parked the bus at his home as he always does to reduce further wear and tear.

The next morning, he would fire up the bus — and do it all over again.

FAILED SCHOOL BUS INSPECTIONS: Part 1: How safe are your children? | Part 2: 'Buses weren't made to run on these roads' | Part 3: How Arizona's regulations compare | The tale of one failing bus | Tell us your story | Search for your child's bus | See our complete coverage | How the investigation unfolded