3/18/22 – EDITORS NOTE: In response to this tragedy, GoFundMe launched a centralized hub to house all of the verified fundraisers for victims of the USW golf team crash. All fundraisers on the hub are verified by the GoFundMe Trust & Safety team and they are working with all campaign organizers to ensure funds safely and quickly reach the victims’ families.
The hub will continually be updated as more verified fundraisers are created: https://www.gofundme.com/c/act/university-of-the-southwest-bus-accident
You can also check our official Twitter thread that is being updated with new fundraisers in real-time: https://twitter.com/gofundme/status/1504228635401605127
For additional information and verified fundraisers contact: Madeline Purdue mpurdue@gofundme.com
A vehicle carrying members of the University of the Southwest’s golf teams collided head-on with a pickup truck on a two-lane road in West Texas, killing multiple people, including some students and the teams’ coach, officials said.
The vehicles crashed Tuesday night in Andrews County. Sgt. Steven Blanco of the Texas Department of Public Safety told KWES-TV there were fatalities in both vehicles, but the number of dead wasn’t immediately released.
“It’s a very tragic scene,” Blanco said. “It’s very, very tragic.”
University president Quint Thurman said in a statement that the vehicle was being driven by the teams’ coach, Tyler James, and was carrying about seven to nine students. He said James and some students were among the dead.
“We are still learning the details about the accident but we are devastated and deeply saddened to learn about the loss of our students’ lives and their coach,” Thurman said in the statement.
Thurman said two students were airlifted to a hospital in Lubbock, Texas, with serious injuries.
The vehicle was transporting members of the school’s men’s and women’s golf teams from a tournament, Blanco said, and the other vehicle involved was a Ford F-150.
The University of the Southwest is a private, Christian college located in Hobbs, New Mexico, near the state’s border with Texas. The teams had been scheduled to play in a tournament Tuesday at Midland College, about 315 miles west of Dallas.
The university tweeted that it was working to notify the family members of those involved in the crash and that counseling and religious services would be available on campus.
The crash happened in the same area — but not the same roadway — where three people were killed in November when a pickup truck crashed into a school bus carrying members of the Andrews High School band. The high school’s band director, the school bus driver and the driver of the pickup truck all died in that crash.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
