28 hurt when bus carrying basketball team overturns

CAMDENTON, Mo. (AP) -- Twenty-eight people were hurt, three seriously, when a bus carrying a high school girls' basketball team overturned on an isolated state road, the Missouri State Highway Patrol said.

The bus was carrying students from the School of the Osage in Kaiser home from a game in Richland when it overturned late Tuesday night on Route C in southeast Camden County.

Cynthia Hoffman, the girls' basketball coach, was among those with minor injuries, the patrol said.

A 16-year-old girl with serious injuries was airlifted to a hospital in Springfield, and two 14-year-old girls whose injuries were also listed as serious were taken to a hospital in Columbia.

Others were taken to hospitals in Osage Beach, Lebanon and Fort Leonard Wood, the patrol said.

The patrol said the bus left the road, overturned onto its right side and struck two trees before coming to rest.

Vicki Wilson, who lives in the area, told Jefferson City television station KRCG that was on her way home from the basketball game when she saw the wreck.

"The kids were getting out of the bus and a lot were laying on the ground," Wilson said.

The bus driver received minor injuries, the patrol said.