Cranston School Bus Bursts into Flames, Nobody Hurt

A Cranston school bus burst into flames on Wilbur Avenue on Friday.

Cranston Fire Department Dep. Chief Paul DeLisi said that Cranston’s Engine 5 responded to Wilbur Avenue at around 11:45 a.m. to douse the fire.

Firefighters responded and found the bus fully engulfed. The driver, an aide and one passenger got out safely, DeLisi said.

A cause has not been determined.

Ray Votto, chief operating officer for Cranston Public Schools, said in a telephone interview that the driver saw smoke coming from the front of the bus under the hood, pulled over and both the driver and the aide promptly escorted the lone child off the bus before calling the fire department.

“The team worked well,” Votto said.

The bus is one of the Cranston school district’s mini-buses and though it will be hard to determine the exact cause of the fire, Votto said that it was likely due to mechanical failure.

“It was a total loss. The fire caused quite a bit of damage,” Votto said. “It was one of our older buses.”

Cranston is in the process of a multi-year plan to replace its aging bus fleet. The city is one of the few Rhode Island communities that owns and operates its own bus fleet and the first crop of new mini-buses are expected to roll in sometime in June.

Votto said that all the city’s buses are inspected twice a year and are not unsafe.

“This one had a malfunction in the engine and burst into flames,” Votto said. But in general, “we feel our buses are safe and if the state of Rhode Island finds they’re not, we’ll take the bus off the road.”

Votto said that the district is in the early stages of a five-year plan to replace its fleet. Some of its older vehicles have upwards of a half-million miles on the odometer. And anyone stuck in traffic behind a Cranston bus can see rust bubbles and rust patches.

Votto said in the budget year just completed, there are additional funds for buses, including several large buses.

Submitted Photo