VIDEO: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools school bus fire captured on video before firefighters arrived and as the first firefighter crew members worked to extinguish the fire (Jett Media Productions).
On Wednesday, February 8, 2012 about 5:00 p.m., Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools school bus driver Lindora Richardson smelled smoked, and stopped her school bus on Bearmore Drive in the Stonehaven subdivision in Charlotte, North Carolina. Richardson had also discovered smoke coming from under the dashboard. She immediately moved all six of her student passengers from Chantilly Montessori to safety. She helped some of the students by lowering them out the back emergency exit, brought the students to a safe area, and called 9-1-1.
A resident that lives in the neighborhood where the bus stopped and burned, captured high quality video of the bus fire and the arrival of firefighters.
A York school bus the same make and model — a Freightliner FS-65 with a Thomas Built school bus body — caught fire about one year ago. CBS-affiliate television station WNCT in Greenville, North Carolina, investigated school bus fires last year after a Thomas Built bus fire there. WNCT discovered that four out of five school bus fires in North Carolina that occurred in 2010 and 2011, were Freightliner FS-65 buses.
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BEARMORE DRIVE LOCATION NOT PRECISE.
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