Fung Wah Bus Passengers Persist Despite Risks

Undergraduates continued to choose the popular Fung Wah Bus service as their mode of transportation home this past holiday weekend despite a recent accident.

Last Wednesday, a speeding Fung Wah passenger bus heading from Boston to New York crashed on I-90. The driver, Jimmy Chow, lost control of the vehicle and veered into the right guardrail at Exit 19, near the Allston-Brighton toll booths, according to Massachusetts State Police Sergeant Robert Bousquet.

The bus held 35 passengers, none of whom sustained injuries. The disabled bus was towed from the scene, shutting down the Turnpike for five minutes, Bousquet said. A second Fung Wah bus was dispatched soon after to transport the passengers to New York.

Fung Wah is popular among students and several said that the recent accident would not deter them from using the bus line.

Allison J. La Fave ’10­ said she is aware of Fung Wah’s purported “sketchiness,” but insisted that she “wouldn’t shy away from using Fung Wah” for future New York jaunts.

“I braved the open road on Fung Wah,” La Fave wrote in an e-mail. “I’m not going to lie; I have no complaints. Fung Wah provided me a super-cheap mode of transportation, and I didn’t have to wait around.”

Following last week’s accident, Chow was cited for speeding, failure to use care in stopping, negligent care while operating a vehicle, and maintaining a false driver’s log, according to Bousquet. Commercial Motor Vehicle Officer Steven Strang, who was present at the scene, also found that the bus’ brakes were defective.

According to Joe Mokrisky, a Fung Wah consultant on transportation safety, other bus carriers had already shut down Boston-New York service, calling into question the decision to forge ahead.

Fung Wah suffered a major setback in August of 2005, when one of its carriers burst into flames, with fleeing passengers creating a publicity nightmare. The past six months have been unkind to Fung Wah, featuring a rollover in September that injured over 30 passengers, a wheel malfunction in January, as well as the most recent accident.

After the September incident, Fung Wah hired Mokrisky to implement a comprehensive driver training program. Concerning the safety of the carrier, Mokrisky says that “it is obvious Fung Wah did not have a total understanding of the regulations,” but considers the most recent accident “unfortunate because they had made tremendous advances in a short amount of time.”

Jimmy Zhao ’08 has ridden Fung Wah three or four times, most recently over intersession. He said, “I’ve heard rumors, but I’ve never had a bad experience.”

Even in light of recent safety violations, Zhao said he will still use Fung Wah—mostly because it’s “convenient and just really cheap.”

Duane DeBruyne, a spokesman for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration in Washington, D.C. said, “It’s pretty obvious that they are under a lot of scrutiny, and they recognize that they must overcome that.”

While DeBruyne declined to comment on Fung Wah’s safety directly, he did note that as an industry, “the curbside carriers’ safety performance is no better and no worse than traditional carriers.”

Still, he insisted that the administration will keep an eye on Fung Wah, with “driver qualifications, including English proficiency, being something we will watch as we move forward.”

The president of Fung Wah, Pei Liang, did not return requests for comment.