Students across West Virginia are returning to classrooms this week. But one county had to delay the start of their school year.
Pleasants County Schools were forced to cancel their first day of Fall classes Monday after a fire at a business near the county bus garage damaged seven buses.
Eric Croasman, director of personnel, curriculum and instruction for Pleasants County Schools said the county was notified of the fire at approximately 3 a.m. Monday morning.
“At that time, the transportation director did an all-call to the bus operators, and we had multiple bus operators immediately report to the transportation department to start moving buses away from the business that was engulfed in flames,” he said.
Croasman said the fire caused only cosmetic damage to most of the vehicles and the delay gave staff time to inspect them thoroughly.
“Safety is always our first priority, and we wanted to make sure we had adequate time to assess the damage and inspect all buses to make sure they were safe to transport students,” Croasman said.
In a Facebook post Monday night, the school district said all bus routes are running as scheduled after being repaired and inspected. Neighboring school districts were quick to offer assistance, and Croasman said Tyler County Schools provided two spare buses.
“We have all of our spare buses in service currently while we await parts,” he said. “Tyler County provided us with those two buses, just in the instance that we would have a need for a spare bus, and they offered support or offered to help in any way with repairs and that type of stuff if needed.”
Croasman said damage could have been far worse were it not for the quick action of bus drivers and other staff moving vehicles away from the fire.
“We’re very fortunate,” he said. “We had minor cosmetic damage. It could have been far worse had it not been for the swift action of those individuals who came in to move the buses. So we’re very, very fortunate that the damage was as minor as it was.”