All of the teens suffered some degree of injury, ranging from bumps and bruises to head injuries, and at least three girls were seriously hurt. The accident could have been much worse had the bus not struck a water main before toppling over, authorities said.

The bus, one of five in a convoy belonging to Excellent Bus Service Inc. of Brooklyn, was loaded with Hasidic girls, ages 14 to 18, who had spent the weekend at Ferndale's Camp Gila for a Shabbos retreat. The group was heading back home to Monsey in Rockland County at the time of the crash.

They had come Friday afternoon from Bais Yaakov, a private girl's school for ninth to 12th grades, which rents the camp one weekend a year. About 350 people were on the five buses, a camp official said. The accident happened about five minutes outside the camp. Just after 6 a.m., the

driver lost control of the vehicle at the bottom of a steep hill on Ferndale-Loomis Road, said state police Lt. Kevin Costello.

The bus crashed through a guardrail and skidded along a large water main before flipping into the creek 25 feet below. The front end of the bus lay on the steep bank, its side door pressed into the rock and dirt beneath. The rear of the bus rested in the shallow creek. Survivors said the bus appeared to gather speed as it headed downhill on Ferndale-Loomis Road. Then, without warning, the passengers were thrown about the bus as it slid down the embankment.

Amid the screams of the terrified, some cut by flying glass, one girl began to mutter the Shema Yisroel, a Hebrew prayer to say before dying.

The bus had skidded to a stop on its side, leaving the victims tangled on top of each other. The smell of diesel fuel filled the bus, survivors said. Some victims made their way out of the bus on their own as several feet of water filled the rear of the vehicle.

Within minutes, rescuers were scrambling through the bus' front window, leading those who could walk to safety. Debris floated in the back, and troopers feared they might find victims in the 4-feet of water. Troopers escorted the final two victims out of the bus through thick black smoke. Others had to be carried on backboards or strapped into baskets to be brought up the near-vertical embankment to safety.

Shivering girls, some with blood streaming down their faces, others with gauze wrapped around their heads, comforted one another. Firefighters and EMTs gave the girls blankets and their own turn-out coats to keep them warm. The rescue response was swift, with firefighters and EMTs from 14 ambulance companies responding.

Everyone agreed the crash could have been worse.

"That [water] pipe really saved them," said Dick Martinkovic, the county's emergency management officer. Without the pipe, he said, the bus would have plunged full-speed, straight into the creek. There would almost certainly have been fatalities if that had happened.

Although badly shaken, the girls followed instructions from firefighters and stayed reasonably calm, Martinkovic said. The most seriously injured were taken to Catskill Regional Medical Center in Harris. Less-severe injuries were treated at the Arden Hill Campus of Orange Regional Medical Center in Goshen. Catskill's Harris campus treated 38 of the patients; another 10 were sent to its Callicoon branch. Four were taken to Arden Hill, Catskill Spokesperson Kaytee Warren said. "We had a lot of scratches and bruises – a large number of x-rays," Warren said.

Fifteen doctors and extra nurses scrambled to the hospital. "Everything went very smoothly, and people worked hard, especially the nurses," said Dr. David Schwalb, one of those called in to Harris.

Authorities called in a helicopter, but it couldn't land because of cloud cover, Warren said. Two patients, aged 17 and suffering from more serious injuries were taken by ambulance to Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla, said Rabbi Isaac Leider, the emergency services liaison. They are in stable condition with head injuries that are not considered life threatening, Leider said. A hospital spokesman couldn't confirm their condition. Another victim suffering from abdominal injuries was transported to Hackensack Medical Center, troopers said.

A school bus carried girls with minor injuries to one of the area hospitals, Martinkovic said. EMTs rode along with the girls, and state police escorted the bus. There were a number of wounds from shattered glass, including some eye injuries, he said.

Water, which had sprayed like a small fountain from broken joints in the pipe, still showered down into the creek hours later as state police conducted their investigation. State Department of Environmental Conservation police and a spill-response technician were called to dispose of the gallons of fuel that spilled from the bus' full tank into the Middle Mongaup.

The cause of the crash is under investigation, but the driver was charged with driving at an unsafe speed. No skid marks appeared on the roadway, an indication of possible brake failure, police said.

Police are also looking into whether the bus exceeded its passenger capacity. No capacity was listed on the side of the vehicle, police said. This crash was the latest casualty of the steep hill at the end of Ferndale-Loomis Road.

On May 22, 2003, a garbage truck's air brakes failed as it descended Ferndale-Loomis Road, and it ended up in the creek. In 2001, a 79-year-old man died in a mini-van crash there.

"That's such a bad hill," said Valerie Hummel, whose teenage kids were awakened by the crash. "All the time, you hear people squealing tires. All the time."