Wednesday 17th November 1993

The M40 Minibus Crash occurred just before midnight. It involved a minibus and a motorway maintenance vehicle. The minibus was transporting 14 children home from a concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London (UK), when it veered into the back of the maintenance truck which was parked on the hard shoulder near Warwick. The driver of the minibus, 35-year-old teacher Eleanor Fry, and 10 of the children died at the scene of the crash. Two other children died in hospital from their injuries, while the remaining two children who survived the crash recovered from relatively minor injuries. The three men in the rescue truck were unharmed, and pulled many of the minibus’s occupants clear of the wreckage. All of the children involved were 12 and 13 year old pupils from Hagley R C High School in Haglet, near Birmingham.