A motorcoach barreling down Interstate 95 in the dark slammed into vehicles stopped for a work zone in Stafford County, Virginia, early Friday morning, killing five people, four of them from the same family, and hospitalizing 44 others. The driver, 48-year-old Jing S. Dong of Staten Island, obtained his Commercial Driver's License in New York in 2024 despite not speaking English, the New York Post reported.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy called the crash "unacceptable" and announced a federal review of New York's licensing records, the driver's training documentation, and his history behind the wheel.
The chain-reaction collision, which involved at least six vehicles on southbound I-95 near Quantico just after 2:30 a.m. on May 29, wiped out nearly an entire family headed to a wedding. It left three more patients in critical condition. And it raised a question that should trouble every American who shares the road with commercial vehicles: How does a man who cannot read English road signs or communicate with law enforcement end up licensed to drive a bus full of passengers through the night?
Dmitri Doncev, 45, was a registered nurse in the mental health unit at Holyoke Medical Center in Massachusetts. His wife, Ecaterina, was 44. Their daughter Emily was 13. Their son Mark was 7. All four were killed when the bus struck a Chevrolet Suburban, which then slammed into the Doncevs' Acura.
A fifth victim, a 25-year-old woman from Worcester, Massachusetts, who has not been publicly identified, died inside the Suburban.
The Doncev family had immigrated to the United States in 2008 and settled in Greenfield, Massachusetts. Family friend Anatoliy Bublik wrote on a GoFundMe page that they were traveling to South Carolina for a family wedding when they were killed.
Dmitri's brother, Iuri Doncev, posted on Facebook:
"With broken hearts, we share the devastating loss of our beloved brother and his family in the tragic accident on South I-95 in Virginia early this morning."
Emily and Mark attended Providence Christian Academy. The school issued a statement confirming the loss:
"Providence Christian Academy is deeply saddened by the tragic loss of the Doncev family, following a motor vehicle accident on Interstate 95. The Doncev family was a cherished part of our school community, and their loss is being felt deeply by our students, families, faculty, and staff."
A family that came to this country legally, built a life, served their community, gone in seconds.
The preliminary investigation paints a straightforward picture. Virginia State Police stated:
"The preliminary investigation indicates that traffic was slowing southbound for an upcoming work zone. A bus failed to slow for traffic and struck six vehicles."
The motorcoach was traveling from New York City to Charlotte, North Carolina. Just The News identified the bus operator as E&P Travel. Criminal charges against Dong are pending as authorities continue to investigate the cause of the crash. Dong himself was hospitalized after the collision.
Forty-four people were taken to hospitals. Three remained in critical condition. Newsmax reported that all five fatalities were occupants of vehicles struck by the bus, not passengers on the motorcoach itself. The National Transportation Safety Board has opened a safety investigation into the crash.
The central scandal here is not the crash alone. Fatal highway accidents, while devastating, happen. The scandal is what came before it, the decision by New York State to hand a Commercial Driver's License to a man who does not speak English.
Jing S. Dong, a Chinese national who holds U.S. citizenship, received his CDL from New York in 2024. Federal regulations require that commercial drivers be able to read and speak English well enough to understand highway signs and signals, respond to official inquiries, and make entries on reports and records. That is not a suggestion. It is a condition of licensure.
Yet Dong apparently cleared whatever process New York had in place. How? That remains unanswered. The details of his training, testing, and the identity of whoever administered his CDL exam have not been disclosed. Nor has anyone explained whether New York's procedures were followed or whether they were simply inadequate.
Secretary Duffy did not mince words. He said the administration is reviewing New York's licensing records, training documentation, and the driver's history. His statement framed the issue in terms that should be hard for anyone to argue with:
"If you can't be properly trained, read our road signs, or communicate with law enforcement, you have no business driving a bus."
He added a warning aimed further up the chain:
"Any company, trainer, or school that contributed to putting an unqualified driver on the road will face intense scrutiny."
Duffy also called the crash a "horrific crime" and said his prayers were with the families of the victims and the injured.
Consider the layers of failure required for this to happen. A driver who cannot speak English must have been trained, by someone. He must have been tested, by someone. He must have been hired, by someone. He must have been dispatched on a nighttime interstate run carrying passengers, by someone. At every stage, a person or institution had the opportunity to say no. None of them did.
The motorcoach company, identified as E&P Travel, has not publicly commented. Its safety record, its hiring practices, and its role in verifying Dong's qualifications are all open questions. Duffy's promise of "intense scrutiny" for companies, trainers, and schools that put unqualified drivers on the road suggests the federal government intends to follow that chain to its origin.
But the starting point is New York's CDL process. If the state issued a license to a driver who could not meet the basic English-language requirement, then the state created the conditions for this crash. Every mile Dong drove after that was a mile driven under a credential he should not have held.
The investigation remains in its early stages, and several critical questions are unanswered. Authorities have not disclosed whether mechanical failure, driver fatigue, or some other factor contributed to the crash beyond the apparent failure to slow down. The specific criminal charges being considered, whether negligent homicide, vehicular manslaughter, or something else, have not been announced. Weather and visibility conditions at the time of the 2:30 a.m. collision have not been detailed. The number of passengers on the motorcoach has not been made public.
The identity of the 25-year-old woman from Worcester killed in the Suburban has not been released. Her relationship to the Doncev family, if any, is unclear.
And the most important question of all, how New York's CDL testing process allowed a non-English-speaking applicant to pass, has no public answer yet.
The Doncev family did everything right. They came to America lawfully. They built a life. Dmitri served patients in a hospital mental health unit. Their children attended a Christian school. They were driving to a family wedding. They were on the road at 2:30 in the morning because that is what families do, they drive through the night to be together.
They were killed by a bus driver who, if the reporting is accurate, could not read the work-zone signs that told every other driver on that stretch of I-95 to slow down.
Secretary Duffy is right to demand answers from New York. He is right to put companies and training schools on notice. But the accountability cannot stop at press statements. If New York's licensing system is issuing CDLs to drivers who cannot meet federal language requirements, then every commercial license that state has issued deserves a second look. The traveling public has a right to know that the driver of the bus they are riding, or the bus bearing down on them in the next lane, can read the signs.
Five people are dead. Four of them shared a last name and a family car. The youngest was seven years old. Somewhere in a New York State office, someone stamped "approved" on a CDL application that should have been denied. That stamp has a body count now.
