Grady County, OK — September 8, 2025, Cody Schmidt and six people were injured in a bus accident at about 8 p.m. on State Highway 152 west of Minco.
Authorities said a school bus carrying the Minco High School softball team overturned after hitting a deer near County Road 2760 as the team was returning from a game. There were 18 people on the bus.
Bus driver Cody Schidt, the softball team’s head coach, and six were injured in the crash, according to authorities.
Authorities have not released any additional information about the Grady County crash at this time. The accident is still under investigation.
Commentary by Attorney Michael Grossman
When people hear that a school bus overturned after hitting a deer, most assume there’s not much more to investigate. But as someone who’s handled more than my fair share of commercial vehicle cases, including many involving buses, I can tell you: the presence of a deer only answers one question. It doesn’t explain everything that matters.
We’re told the bus hit a deer and overturned, injuring several people, including the driver and students. That raises a number of unanswered questions. For starters, how fast was the bus going at the time of the crash? Did the deer come out of nowhere, or was there a chance to brake or swerve? Was the driver distracted? Did mechanical failure play a role? And perhaps most importantly: was it reasonable for the bus to overturn from hitting a deer?
These aren’t idle questions. They go straight to the heart of whether this was a freak accident or something preventable. In my experience, most bus and truck crashes aren’t caused by a single factor. They result from a chain of missed opportunities, lapses in judgment or breakdowns in oversight.
In a case like this, the bus’s electronic control module (or ECM, the vehicle’s “black box”) could be key. It can tell us how fast the bus was going, whether the brakes were applied and what steering input occurred before the crash. Was the driver speeding? Did they brake too late or swerve too sharply? These are the kinds of details that determine whether a crash like this was truly unavoidable, or not.
We also don’t yet know if this was a commercial-grade bus or a smaller vehicle under different safety standards. That matters too. The structural integrity of a bus, its center of gravity and whether passengers were seated or standing all affect whether hitting a deer should reasonably result in a rollover.
And then there’s the human element. Did the school district properly train and vet the coach who was driving? Was he operating under fatigue? Was there any kind of policy in place for night travel or wildlife risk on rural roads? Until those questions are answered, it’s premature to treat this like a “no-fault” situation.
I’ve handled bus crash cases where a poorly maintained tire blew out and caused a rollover. In another, a school district failed to address a known steering issue. On paper, those incidents looked like freak accidents. But when we pulled back the curtain, the story changed.
Getting to the truth takes more than reading a police report. It takes an independent investigation, starting with crash scene photos, ECM data, cell phone records and driver training files. Without that, we’re just guessing.
Key Takeaways:
- Hitting a deer doesn’t automatically explain why a school bus overturned.
- Black box data and driver records are essential to understanding whether this crash was avoidable.
- The crash raises questions about driver training, speed and mechanical condition.
- Bus rollover from a deer strike may point to deeper structural or handling issues.
- Only a thorough investigation can determine if this was truly unavoidable or preventable.
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