Bus Driver Hailed A Hero for Saving Kids on Burning Bus

BALTIMORE (WJZ)--A Maryland school bus driver is being hailed a hero after rescuing 20 students from a burning school bus.

"By the time I got the mic, one of my little ones said, 'No, miss bus driver, it's fire!" said Renita Smith, the school bus driver.

As the fire raged out of control on 51st Avenue in College Park, the bus driver, Renita Smith, had only one thing on her mind.

"I unbuckled my seat belt, I opened my door, and I got my babies off the bus," said Smith. "I didn't even think, I just ran in."

A witness wrote on Facebook that one by one Smith got all 20 kids off the burning bus.

"I felt scared. I was about to cry but my brother did instead, so I helped him," said one kid on the bus.

Not one of the kids was hurt and after watching the video of smoke and fire shooting through her bus, the magnitude of what could have been...Is now sinking in.

"That's what brought the tears and the emotion, because of the what if and I didn't know it was that bad until after," said Smith.

"My biggest reward is my babies are safe. Because whenever I'm driving any school, they're my children until I drop them off to their biological parents."

It's that parental instinct that saved all of those kids. As for what sparked that blaze is still not clear.

Those children attend Glen Arden Woods Elementary.

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