Sep 21, 2006 4:57 pm US/Central
Wilmer Marks One Year Since Deadly Bus Fire
by Brooke Richie
WILMER (CBS 11 News) ―
It was one of the worst accidents in Texas history. This Saturday will mark one year since a bus fire in Wilmer killed 23 Hurricane Rita evacuees. Several brave witnesses managed to save some of the senior citizens on board. And they haven't forgotten.
"I travel this way every day to and from work, see the cross and the memorial out here. So it's a constant reminder every day that it happened," says Jason Saulsbury.
"It's hard to go by there and not think about it," says Wilmer police officer Tony Shaw.
But it's not just the roadside memorial that triggers their memories. The images of September 23, 2005 still haunt them.
"The first time all you could really see was real smoky," Officer Shaw says. "In just a matter of minutes, you couldn't really put your head in it it was so hot."
Officer Shaw pulled three people off the fiery bus. Then there was an explosion.
"I was mad because I knew there other people on the bus, and I couldn't get to them," he says.
In anger, he punched a squad car and an ambulance, breaking his knuckle. His wife says he was different for months.
"I was a lot quieter I guess after it happened and stuff."
Jason Saulsbury was a civilian hero - a passerby who saved four from the burning bus.
"Complete disbelief after that explosion happened. I was really beside myself," he says.
Today, when he drives by the scene, he says, "I think about my son. I think about how quick life can take a real quick change of events."
Saulsbury and Officer Shaw both testified at the national transportation safety board hearings in August. Federal investigators determined that the fire started in the right back wheel of the bus, but they're still trying to learn why. A question the witnesses that day continue to ask.
"You don't get over it, but you deal with it," Shaw says.
The next step is for members of the national transportation safety board to take everything they learned from here and to prepare a final report. They say by the two-year anniversary, there should be changes in place.
(© MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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