The woman who plowed her Ford SUV into the side of a Los Angeles bus was under the influence of drugs at the time.

Bailee Lynn Rios, 36, was charged with murder Wednesday morning and was being held on $4.03 million bail. 

She is also facing additional counts of driving under the influence and reckless driving, as Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman claimed she was impaired by drugs and narcotics were found inside her vehicle.

‘What is particularly tragic about this case is that this is a preventable tragedy,’ Hochman said at a news conference on Thursday.

‘Ms Rios did not have to get behind the wheel impaired,’ he continued. ‘She did not have to drive on the other side of the road. She did not have to blow through the red light at full force to drive her SUV right into a Metro bus. That was all preventable.’ 

‘She chose, and that was a choice by her, to do what she did and that choice has resulted in deadly and destructive consequences.’ 

Gage Weida, 31, and Daniel Castillo, 46, died in the Los Angeles metro bus crash at around 5pm on Tuesday.

An NBC helicopter that arrived to film the wreckage went down in a nearby parking lot about two hours later and burst into flames.

Eliana Moreno, 38, and pilot George Marciniw, 70, were killed in the chopper crash, along with Edy Gutierrez Mejia, 29, a Guatemalan tourist who was on the ground.

The SUV driver, Bailee Lynn Rios, 36, was charged with murder on Wednesday morning. She was held on $4.03 million bail

Two people were killed when an SUV plowed into a Los Angeles metro bus on Tuesday

Police have said Rios drove her Ford Expedition the wrong way down De Soto Avenue ‘well beyond the speed limit,’ running a red light as she plowed into the bus.

The deadly crash was caught on camera, showing how the bus veered into a utility pole, before ejecting one passenger and partially ejecting another. 

This is a breaking news story.