AFTER BUS FIRE, QUESTIONS ABOUT FIRE TRUCK DELAYS

By Juan Montoya

The eyewitnesses to the fire that completely gutted a Brownsville Independent School District school bus and forced 29 students to flee through the rear emergency exit to escape the smoke and flames say that the first fire trucks to arrive at the scene got there more than 15 minutes after the initial call and too late to stop the fire.
BISD law enforcement and fire department personnel credit the quick action of bus driver Norma Medina for preventing what might have been a tragedy. None of the 29 students nor the driver were hurt.
Now, as details emerge about the call made to emergency dispatchers, a comedy of errors is being revealed that – if not for the driver and students' quick actions – might have resulted in a tragedy.
According to sources close to the fire department, dispatchers underestimated the severity of the vehicle fire and first only sent police cruisers to investigate. The officers were kept from approaching the bus because when they arrived the vehicle was engulfed in flames and the acrid smoke made for poor visibility at the intersections. The frontage road is a one-way and the bus was burning jut before it reached the intersection with 14th Street.
Sources say that it wasn't until some 15 to 19 minutes later that the dispatchers realized the enormity of the emergency and alerted the fire stations. The closest fire station was the main station downtown on Adams, but it just so happened that the engine and firefighters from the station were receiving training at the old Amigoland mall. To make matters worse, as the fire engine arrived at the tracks on Palm Boulevard, they were caught up in traffic because a freight train was blocking the way.
Unable to arrive quickly, the instructed the dispatchers to call the stations at Old Alice and Southmost. The
Southmost unit arrived at the scene in about 3 and a half minutes.
"If the unit from the main station hadn't been in training and blocked by the train, they would have been there in the regulation time of under five minutes," they said.
It is unclear whether anything could have bee done at all to stop the fire in the old International bus. BISD Transportation staffers say this is the second time one of the old fleet of buses has had an electrical fire. The district board of trustees recently approved the purchase of new buses. The new buses will be built by the Thomas Company, a different maker than International.
Eyewitnesses at the scene said that the driver and students congregated across the frontage road as they watched thick black smoke emanate from the burning bus with such heat and intensity that it melted the hood and sidewalls of the front of the bus and then burst out the windows as the flames moved through the entire vehicle.
Firefighters were scooping the remnants of the charred metal and plastic from the curb after the flames had been doused.