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Isellbuses
Top Member
Canada
828 Posts |
 Posted - 07/19/2004 : 12:24:42 PM
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Cockroaches invade lunch boxes on school bus
By DAVE BREITENSTEIN, debreitenstein@naplesnews.com
July 19, 2004
After three hours of slipping down spiral tubes and swimming under the blistering rays at Sun Splash Family Waterpark, Shelby and Cassidy Visconti were eager to dive into their lunches.
The sisters went back to the school bus, retrieved their lunch bags, then headed to a picnic area with other participants Wednesday in Bonita Springs' summer recreation program.
What happened next, though, was straight out of a horror story. One by one, children popped open their lunch boxes to find cockroaches scurrying for their lives. Some children fled the scene; others cautiously rooted through their turkey sandwiches and chocolate chip cookies to find out if their lunches were invaded, too.
"It was so nasty because they just kept crawling out," Cassidy said.
Cockroaches that apparently were laying low inside of the school bus squirmed their way into a free meal soon after children went inside the Cape Coral water park. The bus was provided by the Lee County School District, but Transportation Director Lou Karnbach said the bus driver failed to thoroughly check for infestation before leaving the transportation depot.
Most of the school district's 700-plus buses sit idle during the summer months and are not inspected daily. That's also the same time of year when bugs are scouring the area for food and new homes.
"We have more of a problem controlling it during the summer because of the heat," Karnbach said.
Children enrolled in the Recreation Center's summer programs make frequent day trips to Sun Splash, Broadway Palm Dinner Theater and other off-site locations. Camp Surge, the program for 6- to 11-year-olds, used two buses last week to transport 100 children to the water park. Children riding the second bus reported no bug problems.
Camp Surge coordinators told the 50 children onboard the infested bus not to even nibble on the potentially contaminated food. Senior Recreation Specialist Cathy Dillon said some of the program's participants had cash to purchase food at the park, and many children shared their meals so none of their friends would go hungry.
The infested bus was pulled from its rotation and will be bug-bombed, Karnbach said Friday, and the driver was told to not take out another bus before performing extensive interior checks. The job description for school bus drivers requires them to maintain a clean and safe vehicle, and multiple offenses can warrant disciplinary action, Karnbach said.
"Some drivers keep their buses immaculate, and some do not," he added.
Children said the creepy insects were German cockroaches, the type that prefer warm weather and breed continuously. German cockroaches primarily survive by scavenging on scraps of food waste, but as uneasy as they make humans feel, Karnbach said the transportation department has been waging a battle against a variety of bugs for years.
"There's all kinds of ways critters can get into buses," he said. "You're in Florida. You can get ants, spiders, bugs or anything in a vehicle."
Camp Surge participants will be visiting Sun Splash again this week. Even though the Visconti sisters are avid fans of the NBC television show "Fear Factor" and live in author Stephen King's summer retreat town of Bradley, Maine, their eerie experience last week has changed their lunch plans.
"We're not bringing our lunches next time," Shelby said.
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Sherm
Top Member
USA
621 Posts |
Posted - 07/19/2004 : 1:11:16 PM
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| Ok, so now drivers have to be responsible for ensuring their vehicle is "bug free." Find a bug in the bus one too many times then fire the driver? C'mon, now. |
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coolbusdriver
Top Member
Canada
1509 Posts |
Posted - 07/20/2004 : 04:21:48 AM
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| This story does not say how dirty the bus was to begin with. Seems to me if there were that many bugs on it, it must hve been quite dirty. I would also not allow the kids to leave thier lunch on the bus on a hot summer day, I would worry about food spoilage before bugs, those buses get so hot sitting in the sun! |
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Thomasbus24
Administrator
USA
4544 Posts |
Posted - 07/20/2004 : 09:59:46 AM
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I too am guessing that this must have been one filthy dirty bus PRIOR to the trip. In a clean bus, what is there to attract roaches? There isn't any food substance (generaly speaking).
We once had an old pusher infested with mice because the driver always kept cookies and garbage like that in her area, so the mice came from all over the place and made it 'home'. That was bad enough...BUT ROACHES? Please.
Side note: A school a little ways south of here once had a small stalk of corn growing in the rear corner of a bus one summer.
Dirty bus+farm boys w/ corn stuck on boot+normal bus water leakage=CORN!!!!!
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Edited by - Thomasbus24 on 07/20/2004 10:01:06 AM |
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thomas86_a
Top Member
USA
4413 Posts |
Posted - 07/20/2004 : 2:56:30 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by coolbusdriver
This story does not say how dirty the bus was to begin with. Seems to me if there were that many bugs on it, it must hve been quite dirty. I would also not allow the kids to leave thier lunch on the bus on a hot summer day, I would worry about food spoilage before bugs, those buses get so hot sitting in the sun!
When I first started reading the story I was thinking the same thing about the food spoilage. On a hot sunny day a bus gets very hot so it wouldn't take long for the food to go bad. As for the bus itself I would have to see it's condition before making the call on what should be done to the driver, if the bugs themselves were hiding under seats and other areas that are hard to see it would be hard to do a "bug inspection". On the ohter hand if the bugs were attracted because of the condition of the bus then the driver needs to keep the bus clean. |
If you have an International, you NEED customer service. |
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mr.dave
Advanced Member
USA
414 Posts |
Posted - 07/20/2004 : 8:05:22 PM
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Our rules say not to eat or drink on the bus.Kids sneak food aboard in pockets and book bags. The high seatbacks hide all activities fron the prying eyes of the driver. Kids devide the food between that to be eaten, and that to be crammed between seat cushions or dropped on the floor. If the driver does catch a child eating on the bus the school officials could care less. Busses are designed with self rotting flooring plus nummerus inaccessable nooks and crannies, making cleaning properly next to impossible. It's a wonder we don't have snakes.
salom dave |
Shiny side up, greasy side down |
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Thomas Ford 85-16
Top Member
USA
4177 Posts |
Posted - 07/21/2004 : 06:54:32 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by mr.dave
Busses are designed with self rotting flooring plus nummerus inaccessable nooks and crannies, making cleaning properly next to impossible. It's a wonder we don't have snakes.
salom dave
Well now that you mention that, it's a wonder that there's no breed of animal that has a super strong stomach and vacates the area on command... If they did exist, you could just release them in the bus lot, have them lick and eat every nook and cranny of the buses over night, and then ask them all to leave the bus in the morning. You'd have a perfectly clean each day! Too bad... |
Mike's Bus Yard - http://buses.zwebpages.com - Since 1999
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busdrver4jesus
Top Member
USA
802 Posts |
Posted - 07/21/2004 : 12:14:43 PM
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| The way it is here - no matter how well you clean your bus before summer break - it will be dirty when you pick it back up. The buses sit in a grassy field all summer long - the doors most of the time left open - so God only knows what we will find on bus pick up day. Plus, over the summer they change seat covers that are damaged, and the paper and stuff the kids have stuffed between the seats is all dumped out in the floor for us to clean up. We have complained about this year after year. If our buses are turned in spotless, they should be returned that way. |
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coolbusdriver
Top Member
Canada
1509 Posts |
Posted - 07/21/2004 : 6:13:00 PM
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quote:
The way it is here - no matter how well you clean your bus before summer break - it will be dirty when you pick it back up. The buses sit in a grassy field all summer long - the doors most of the time left open - so God only knows what we will find on bus pick up day. Plus, over the summer they change seat covers that are damaged, and the paper and stuff the kids have stuffed between the seats is all dumped out in the floor for us to clean up.
What a pain that must be!
Here we have 2 people hired for the summer whose only job is to take a bus and from bumper to bumper inside and out clean it. The seats are taken apart and fixed if needed,the bus is swept and scrubbed, etc.etc. When we come back in Sept, it is to a very clean bus.
The mechanics also work all summer doing all the extras that are needed and tuning up every bus on the lot.
We do have some buses that go out on trips in the summer, but they make sure those get cleaned as well before the first day of school.
By the sounds of what some of you have to put up with we are truley blessed with a great bunch here!
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Mitchell
Top Member
Canada
741 Posts |
Posted - 07/29/2004 : 10:38:53 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by coolbusdriver
quote:
The way it is here - no matter how well you clean your bus before summer break - it will be dirty when you pick it back up. The buses sit in a grassy field all summer long - the doors most of the time left open - so God only knows what we will find on bus pick up day. Plus, over the summer they change seat covers that are damaged, and the paper and stuff the kids have stuffed between the seats is all dumped out in the floor for us to clean up.
What a pain that must be!
Here we have 2 people hired for the summer whose only job is to take a bus and from bumper to bumper inside and out clean it. The seats are taken apart and fixed if needed,the bus is swept and scrubbed, etc.etc. When we come back in Sept, it is to a very clean bus.
The mechanics also work all summer doing all the extras that are needed and tuning up every bus on the lot.
We do have some buses that go out on trips in the summer, but they make sure those get cleaned as well before the first day of school.
By the sounds of what some of you have to put up with we are truley blessed with a great bunch here!
Wow!Thats good an excellent cleaning job must take quite a while. What bus company do you drive for? |
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JC Theriault
Top Member
Canada
1326 Posts |
Posted - 07/29/2004 : 11:18:31 AM
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| We use to take about 1.5 days for one person to clean, scrub then mop and wax the interior of a bus. Thats a 7 hour workday after breaks and lunch. |
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wagonmaster
Top Member
USA
2298 Posts |
Posted - 08/02/2004 : 06:52:42 AM
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Let me 'splain it to you folks who don't know about bugs in the deep south. No matter how well you clean the bus it won't make any difference as long as there is a food source inside! The bugs will come! The chemicals we are allowed to use to treat them aren't as harsh as those you can you at home (read, effective!). We use what the pest control folks use in the classrooms, and it's pretty mild, because of allergies, etc.
The buses in Lee County aren't dirty. I know Lou Karnbach and haved served on committees with him for over 15 years and he wouldn't knowingly allow that. What folks don't understand is that whenever there is a food source, the bugs WILL come! They may have been no bugs at all in the bus until they parked it during their field trip. The food is the "magic common denominator" in all things relating to bugs and school buses. Remove the food and ensure cleanliness and there won't be any bugs! Kids eat, even when told NOT to! (gasp!) Imagine that? They cram the wrappers and leftovers between the seats where they can't be seen, but the BUGS KNOW!! It's a never ending battle, year 'round for us, but much worse in the summer months!
Joe |
Joe
Land of the Free, because of the Brave! |
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SchoolBusFan
Top Member
USA
1769 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2004 : 6:29:00 PM
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| That's an interesting story. When they bug bombed the bus, would there be chemicals left behind? If a vechicle is left out in the summer for a few days, it's like a shed, you're going to get insects even spiders building homes in there. |
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Cockroaches invade lunch boxes on school bus
