ULYSSES ? Grieving friends and families tried to cope Friday with the crash that killed four Ulysses High School students a day earlier and left another hospitalized in intensive care.

“We’re a small community. This is a tragedy for both our community and our school. It’s going to take awhile,” said Ulysses school superintendent William Hall.

Hall said all five girls were popular sophomores.

“They’re just really good kids,” he said. “They always had smiles on their faces. It’s just a tragedy.”

The students were killed when the Ford Taurus they were in pulled in front of an eastbound semitrailer on U.S. Highway 160 about noon Thursday. Their car was hit on the passenger side and spun three times before coming to rest in a ditch.

The truck driver was unhurt.

The funeral home identified the victims as Victoria R. Dowell, 16; Myranda H. Mason, 16; Julia E. Alcala, 16; and Veronika McDaniel, 15. None was wearing a seat belt, the Kansas Highway Patrol said.

Three of the girls died at the scene and another died while being airlifted to a hospital, said Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper Ron Knoefel.

A fifth student, fellow sophomore Jennifer Longfellow, was in stable condition Friday in the intensive care unit of a hospital in Amarillo, Texas.

Word of the crash spread quickly through the town 5,700, which is about 250 miles west of Wichita in southwest Kansas.

“I think people are mostly in shock,” said Carlos Moral, owner of the weekly Grant County Gazette. “It’s a big deal to a small town like this.”

Moral said everyone was saddened when they realized that four high school students had died in the crash.

“These are four brilliant lives,” he said. “It’s definitely a shocker. They had their whole lives in front of them.”