Business manager Tim Fry confirmed that on Monday August 8, one of two school mini-buses carrying 18 children and five adults down Mt Selwyn skidded in icy conditions, coming to a halt “in a very precarious situation” on the edge of a six-metre slope.

He said the school was taking the accident very seriously and recognised that it had been traumatic for all concerned.

“The accident happened in the evening, coming down from the snow,” Mr Fry said. “I received a call on Monday just after 9pm. Communication was not possible until they arrived back in Adaminiby as the phone service was down, most likely due to the weather.

“Prior to camp, we checked and confirmed that there was Telstra coverage in that area. This is why there was no satellite phone carried.”

Mr Fry said it was about an hour before the bus could resume its journey, and getting the children safely back to their accommodation and ensuring they were emotionally supported had been the main focus.

When the call concluded it was after 10pm, Mr Fry said, which he judged as being too late to ring the parents of the nine children involved.

Next morning, decisions had to be taken about how the camp would proceed.

The children’s scheduled trip back up the mountain was replaced by other local activities, and a new driver was flown down to relieve the shaken parent volunteer and teacher who had been sharing the driving previously.

“All of these arrangements and logistics took us most of the morning and we were also working on the communication with the parents,” Mr Fry said.

“We didn’t want to precipitate trauma. We were trying to ensure that our communication, when it went out, was knowledgeable and reassuring and showed that the situation was being managed and their children were safe.”

The email went out at 3:25pm on the Tuesday, but some of the Class 6 parents felt they should have been informed earlier, and they raised this at a counselling session held the following Monday.

“I made a direct apology about that,” Mr Fry said, noting that everyone understood he had only been in his current role for a couple of weeks. “The lesson I’ve taken from that is we need to be conscious of the timeliness, and it’s certainly something I would look to improve as part of our processes.”

He noted that the bus had been used without incident on trips to the snow and to other locations for over 10 years and that it was properly maintained and had been using snow chains.

He described what happened on the excursion as “an unfortunate accident”, but said it would inform how they conducted future camps.

“We are doing our own investigation to try and understand what went wrong, and if there are lessons for us to learn, and if we can do better,” Mr Fry said. “There’s a thorough review on transport, and drivers, and other matters that may impact the general running of camps.”