Crestline bars bus driver from driving after Friday incident
CRESTLINE — A Crestline school bus driver who reportedly drove erratically with 30 to 35 students aboard after a Friday night football game has been banned from driving buses while school officials look into the incident.
“She is not authorized to drive a bus right now,” Matt Henderson, superintendent of Crestline Exempted Village School District, said Monday. “She's not been put officially on paid leave. That's all part of a process that we have to go through.”
The Bulldogs were on the road Friday night for a game in Strasburg, Ohio, in Tuscarawas County, about 70 miles from Crestline.
“On the way back, one of the drivers of our school bus had a medical issue,” Henderson said.
An incident report from the Crestline Police Department indicated the woman told officers that she “fell and hit her head a couple days ago, is dizzy and just not feeling well.”
The bus she was driving was toward the end of a bus convoy heading home.
“That bus was carrying our band members, color guard and cheerleaders,” Henderson said. “There were probably 30 to 35 students on that bus, as well as chaperones.”
A concerned mother contacted the Telegraph-forum to report that her son had been on the bus and sent her text messages during the ordeal. The mother asked not to be identified out of fear of retribution.
“My son texted me about a quarter till midnight and said their bus driver was throwing up,” the woman said. “He said they had been swerving all over the road.”
The superintendent confirmed that the bus had been driven erratically.
“In terms of the bus swerving, that was reported to me,” Henderson said. “That led to the decision to pull the bus over. I don't have a specific timeframe as to how long she was swerving. We're still looking into all this and investigating it.”
Children were consolidated onto the other buses and driven back to Crestline.
Once at the high school, paramedics and police officers were sent to tend to the woman.
Henderson said alcohol was not a factor in the incident.