TYLER JAMES

Investigators say a Texas man, not his 13-year-old son, was driving the pickup truck that crossed into the oncoming lane and struck a van carrying New Mexico college golfers, killing nine people, and that he had methamphetamine in his system.

A Texas man, not his 13-year-old son, was driving the pickup truck that crossed into the oncoming lane and struck a van carrying New Mexico college golfers, killing nine people, and he had methamphetamine in his system, investigators said Thursday. The National Transportation Safety Board said two days after the March 15 collision in rural West Texas that its early findings suggested that the 13-year-old was driving the pickup that struck the van carrying University of the Southwest students and their coach back to Hobbs, New Mexico, from a golf tournament in Midland. “This was a very difficult investigation to determine some of the facts based on the catastrophic nature of the damage and the post-crash fire," Robert Molloy, the NTSB’s director of highway safety, said at a news conference.

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The investigation into this week’s fiery head-on crash in West Texas now focuses on the revelation that a 13-year-old was driving the pickup truck that struck a van, killing nine people, including six members of a college golf team and their coach.

Authorities investigating a fiery head-on crash in Texas don’t know why a 13-year-old boy was driving while his father sat in the passenger seat.

NTSB Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg said Thursday the truck’s left front tire, which was a spare tire, also blew out before impact.

NTSB Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg said Thursday the truck’s left front tire, which was a spare tire, also blew out before impact.

The pickup crossed into the opposite lane on a darkened, highway before colliding head-on with a van, killing the boy, a man traveling with him, six New Mexico college students and a golf coach.

Six golfers and a coach from a New Mexico university team were killed Tuesday when a pickup swerved into their lane and hit the van they were traveling in.

Most of the students were freshmen who were getting their first taste of life away from home at the private university.

Family and friends say they are heartbroken and devastated after six students and a coach from a small New Mexico university were killed in a fiery crash while returning home from a golf tournament in Texas.

Authorities are trying to determine why a pickup truck crossed into the opposite lane on a darkened, two-lane West Texas highway before colliding head-on with a van, killing nine people including six New Mexico college students and a golf coach.

A 13-year-old was driving the pickup truck that struck a van in West Texas in a fiery collision that killed nine people, National Transportation Safety Board Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg said Thursday. One must be 14 in Texas to start taking classroom courses for a learner’s license and 15 to receive that provisional license to drive with an instructor or licensed adult in the vehicle. Department of Public Safety Sgt. Victor Taylor said a 13-year-old driving would be breaking the law.