What the Lester Vaughan crash says about us

Barbados was lucky on Monday.

Luck – not safety, not responsibility – saved more than two dozen children when a ZR overturned outside Lester Vaughan School. Twenty-five students and one adult were injured. Twenty-five children. One adult.

That simple fact should stop us cold. What was a van, built for public transport and operating off-route, doing packed with schoolchildren and no other adult supervision?

For years, route taxis and minibuses have been allowed to operate with a dangerous mix of freedom and familiarity. Some drivers do their jobs responsibly, but too many others treat the road as a racetrack and the law as optional.

It’s easy to say that students should simply take the government’s free school buses – and many do. But the truth is more complicated. For some, the official buses don’t pass close enough to home or arrive at the right times. For others, the ZR represents convenience and control: a quicker, livelier ride where they feel a sense of independence and belonging.

That mix of accessibility, peer influence, and attitude has created an informal school-run culture of ZRs operating almost exclusively with minors, often without oversight or safeguards. And when things go wrong, as they did outside Lester Vaughan, the result is chaos and trauma.

The police confirmed the ZR involved in Monday’s crash was operating off-route. That is not a mishap – it’s a violation. And it exposes how weak our enforcement remains. Drivers continue to take chances because they believe they can. Owners turn a blind eye because money still flows. Regulators issue warnings instead of consequences.

This incident cannot end with outrage. It must end with reform.

If Barbados is serious about protecting its children and restoring public trust in the PSV sector, several key steps are essential.

First, technology must lead the change. GPS tracking and in-vehicle cameras should be mandatory for all PSVs that transport students with footage and accessible data to regulators. Real-time monitoring would deter speeding, off-route driving, and overcrowding. It would also provide clear evidence when laws are broken.

Second, transparency must become the norm. A simple hotline or digital portal should allow citizens to report reckless driving and, crucially, see visible follow-up action. For too long, complaints have vanished into silence.

Third, the familiar calls for reform – stronger oversight, stricter enforcement, and owner accountability – must finally move from just talk to tangible change. These are not new ideas; they have been discussed, promised and debated for years. What’s missing is the will to act. The ministries of transport and education must coordinate with private PSV operators under enforceable standards, with licensed, background-checked drivers and defined operating hours for student transport. Laws must be enforced without exception and repeat offenders must lose their licences. Owners who allow illegal operations must face heavy penalties, permit revocation, or even prosecution.

Only through consistent enforcement, accountability, transparency, and technology can Barbados ensure that what happened outside Lester Vaughan never happens again.

The road to school should never feel like a risk. Monday’s crash near Lester Vaughan must be the moment Barbados says: enough.

Because luck is not a strategy and luck always runs out.