The video of the incident was shared with KXXV by Kathleen Schmoldt Castro.
The Copperas Cove Independent School District said a bus driver is no longer employed after an incident when the bus tried to cross railroad tracks.
On Sept. 26, Copperas Cove School bus #52 was on route from Copperas Cove High School, transporting about 25 students, when it stopped at the railroad crossing at 17th St. and began to proceed across the tracks.
As the bus entered the tracks, the red flashing light began, the bell sounded and the crossing arm began to come down.
The bus driver reversed the bus off the tracks to ensure the safety of the students, but the crossing arm came down on the bus. The bus was not in contact with the train, and no students were injured.
Hilary Savage was on her way back from picking her children at Copperas Cove High School on Tuesday when they were stopped by a train.
"As I am sitting there it dawns on me that there is a bus on the train tracks," Savage said.
A Copperas Cove ISD School Bus carrying 25 children was on the train tracks.
Savage watched it back up just moments before the train would have hit it.
that's when Kathleen Castro, who was riding with Savage, started recording video that she later posted to Facebook.
"I felt that if it was not posted than it may have gotten slid by or shoved under the rug and I thought that it was important enough that it needed to be out and shared," Castro said.
And it was shared more than one-thousand times and people who commented all seemed to have the same opinion as Castro.
"The bus, I believe was in the wrong and we felt that the safety of the kids was in jeopardy and it was something that needed to be dealt with," Castor said.
Copperas Cove I-S-D dealt with it first thing Tuesday morning with the release of this statement:
" This equates to students being 50 times more likely to arrive at school and back home alive if they take the bus than if they drive themselves or ride with friends,” CCISD Deputy Superintendent of Operations and Support Services Rick Kirkpatrick said. “Our drivers undergo drug and alcohol testing throughout the year and undergo frequent driving record checks to ensure our students are safe.”
CCISD removed the students from the bus and placed them on another bus with a new driver and transported home safely.
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