Three teenagers from the Kansas side of the Kansas City area were killed and ten others hurt when a church van had a tire blow-out and crashed north of Bolivar in southwest Missouri.
According to the Missouri State Highway Patrol, a 14-year-old girl from Louisburg, Kansas, a 16-year-old boy from Olathe, Kansas, and a 17-year-old girl from Stillwell, Kansas, died in the single-vehicle wreck on southbound Highway13 just north of 390th Road, about 5 miles north of Bolivar.
The remaining 10 passengers in the 15-passenger van from Faith Chapel Assembly of God in Overland Park, Kansas, were injured and transported by either ambulance or helicopter to Citizens Memorial Hospital in Bolivar or to hospitals in Springfield. The patrol reported three had serious injuries, with the remaining seven treated for moderate to minor injuries.
The three teenagers who died were transported to Butler Funeral Home in Bolivar.
The van ran off the roadway, overturned and struck a tree with the cause of the crash still under investigation.
