Five people were injured, one seriously, when two coach buses carrying Ottawa high school students collided in Gatineau on Thursday.

Police say the crash occurred on Highway 5, near Highway 50, just over the Macdonald-Cartier Bridge.

The driver of the bus was seriously injured, while a teacher and three students suffered minor injuries.

The collision involved two buses carrying 80 students in Grades 7 to 12 from Lester B. Pearson High School in Gloucester. The students were on a ski trip to Mont Cascades.

One of the buses sustained heavy damage to its front end. The windshield is gone, and the steering wheel was hanging out of the vehicle.

CTV Ottawa's cameras caught one student being removed from the bus in a neck brace. She was put on a stretcher and taken to hospital.

Students told CTV Ottawa the collision happened so quickly that it took them a while to realize what happened.

"We're listening to music, we're jamming, then one second bang, our heads went flying back, whiplash. We hit our heads really hard and we thought, we didn't know what was going on. It was crazy," said one of the students.

The buses were being removed from the scene early Thursday evening.

Quebec provincial police are investigating. The cause of the crash is unknown.

The collision temporarily closed the Macdonald-Cartier Bridge heading into Gatineau; traffic on the King Edward Bridge was also backed up.