St. Paul man stops runaway school bus with 19 students on board
St. Paul man honored as hero after stopping bus
A 27-year-old man from St. Paul jumped onto a runaway school bus carrying 19 Battle Creek Middle School students and stopped it this week. FOX 9’s Maury Glover has the story.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) - Video of Ebro Ahmed stopping a runaway school bus in St. Paul has gone viral and turned the 27-year-old into a national story.
How Ahmed stopped the bus
What we know:
Ahmed said he was kicking a ball outside his family's corner store in St. Paul on Monday afternoon when he saw a school bus slowly rolling down the street with its door open. He said 19 Battle Creek Middle School students were on board and the driver appeared to be having a medical emergency.
Surveillance video shows Ahmed jumping onto the moving bus.
The video shows him mistakenly putting it in reverse before getting it into neutral and pulling the parking brake.
"Am I doing the right thing? Am I doing the wrong thing? Did I read the situation wrong? I thought it was a prank too. And I thought I was dreaming too for a long time," Ahmed said.
Local perspective:
St. Paul Public Schools said paramedics took the driver to the hospital.
The district said the driver has since been released and is resting at home.
District officials also called Ahmed a hero for helping the driver and making sure all the students got home unharmed.
Video of the rescue has gone viral, and Ahmed's actions are making national news.
Ahmed, whose family is from Eritrea, also received a Humanitarian Hero Award from the Human Development Fund for his quick thinking and quick actions on Monday.
Ahmed's inspiration
The backstory:
Ahmed said he has always felt loved by his community, but he said the reaction and recognition has been unexpected.
"They're showing their support and telling me what I did was good and shedding a good light on East Africans and Muslims in general. It's a little overwhelming. Everybody is contacting me, but it's also rewarding," Ahmed said.
Ahmed said watching the TV show "Grey's Anatomy" prepared him to keep calm in the unexpected moment.
Even with the attention, he believes he did what anyone else would have done in the same situation.
"That's just the human in me. I didn't do anything crazy. I saw multiple humans who needed help and felt for them. I have verses from my religion and what my youth coaches taught me and stuff and I used all that they taught me and I went and helped," Ahmed said.
The Source: Reporting from FOX 9's Maury Glover.