An elderly female passenger on a Sonoma County Paratransit bus died Thursday afternoon when the small bus and a flatbed truck hauling a cement mixer collided on state Highway 116 near Sebastopol, the California Highway Patrol reported.
CHP Officer Juan Leon said the woman was the only passenger on the bus.
Sonoma County Paratransit is owned by the county and provides door-to-door bus service for passengers who are physically unable to take the larger, fixed-route Sonoma County Transit buses, an agency spokeswoman said.
The male bus driver and three men in the GMC C6500 flatbed truck suffered moderate to major injuries and were taken to local hospitals, Leon said.
The truck belongs to Kenyon Plastering Inc., Leon said.
The truck was traveling west on Highway 116, about 250 feet east of Llano Road, around 1 p.m. when it turned left into the path of the eastbound bus, Leon said.
"It was an open road. They should have seen each other," Leon said.
Both vehicles suffered damage to the right side, Leon said.
A Sig-alert was issued at 1:39 p.m. Eastbound traffic was diverted to Daywalt Road and westbound traffic had one-way traffic controls, the CHP said.
