Two Bus Fires

http://www.burlingtongazette.ca/two-bus-fires-hundreds-of-thousands-in-damages-but-the-transit-system-is-running-just-fine 

Two bus fires, tens of thousands in damages but the transit system is running just fine.

By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON  November 21. 2012  Transit Advisory meetings are going much better these days. Joanne Vassell-Pittman ended her stint as chair during which time she did a marvelous job under some very trying situations.

Eric Pilon, formerly with Oakville Transit, is the new chair and they seem to be off to a good start.  With Mike Spicer serving as Acting Director of Transit  he had  some good news and some news that was not so good.
Two buses caught fire in a very short period of time.  One was a 2009 New Flyer while the other was a newer 2012 bus from the same company.

They zip in and zip out of the John Street terminal driven by well trained drivers who know what to do when there is an emergency.  Two bus fires in a two week period, while unfortunate, were very well handled by the drivers.  The bus manufacturer is working with the transit people to determine why the fires started in the first place.

Bus fires are  rare, not an everyday event and they certainly scare the daylights out of the passengers when the bus fills with smoke.

Spicer advises that the transit service has a well-honed protocol for handling these situations and in both cases no one was hurt.

The task now is to figure out what started the fires in the first place.  While both buses were New Flyers the two fires started in different parts of each bus.  The manufacturers of the vehicles had their technical people on site pronto and are working with Burlington Transit and the insurance company to get at the bottom of the problem.

Two buses out of service squeezes the vehicle inventory a bit but Spicer says “we still have more than enough buses in the fleet to meet the service demand”.

Should you happen to be on a bus when there is a fire – don’t panic and listen carefully to the bus driver.  They really do know what they are doing – and they will get you off the bus safely.

Serving on the Transit Advisory Committee are:  Eric Pilon – Chair, John Fuca – Vice Chair, Joanne Vassell-Pittman, Nicholas Civiero, Kevin Rahmer, Sonia Harrison, Brian Coleman, Jenny Wen and  Cecille Wyte.
The Committee meets on the third Tuesday of each month at city hall.

Comment on YouTube:  
It's also embarrassing that this (7057-12) was the second bus in BT's fleet to go up within two weeks, as bus.7007-09 went up on October 15th.

 http://www.insidehalton.com/news-story/2905276-two-city-bus-fires-lead-to-investigation/

Two city bus fires lead to investigation

Nov. 01, 2012

The City of Burlington’s acting director of transit says a second city bus fire within two weeks has prompted an inspection of both vehicles to determine a cause and if there is a connection between the two incidents.

One of the city’s 40-foot conventional buses caught fire at the rear of the vehicle, where the engine is located, just before 6 p.m. on Wednesday at the Appleby GO station. 

The driver and 10 passengers got out without injury. 

On Oct. 15, around 2:45 p.m., another 40-foot city bus caught fire in its rear engine compartment during a stop in front of the fire station at Appleby Line and Fairview Street. 

The driver and an unknown number of passengers on the bus at the time safely escaped.

The fire department estimated damage to the bus in the Oct. 15 incident at $100,000.

Mike Spicer, interim head of the city’s transit department, said he hadn’t heard a final damage estimate for the earlier bus fire and didn’t have an initial estimate for the most recent one. 

He said the bus in the Oct. 31 fire is a 2012 model supplied by Winnipeg-based New Flyer Industries. The bus in the earlier fire was a 2009 model from New Flyer. Both have Cummins engines. 

Burlington Transit has 52 conventional buses, about 45 of which are New Flyer models, said Spicer. The city also runs eight Handi-Vans, which are made by a different company. 

Spicer wouldn’t speculate as to whether there are possible safety implications for the majority of the city’s bus fleet but did say the two fires in about two weeks are disconcerting. 

“It seems a little odd that in two weeks we would have two fires,” he said. “The biggest concern is what is the cause and if they are linked in any way, and then to get it rectified.” 

Spicer said he met with transit maintenance staff Thursday morning and asked them to do a “once over” on several random buses. 

He said no city buses have been pulled from service. 

Spicer recalled one other bus fire here about two years ago but not the circumstances. 

The Post ran a photo and story in June 2008 of a Burlington Transit bus that caught fire on John Street downtown. No one was injured. 

The fire raged at the rear of the vehicle. At the time, then fire department spokesperson Ben Rotsma said the cause appeared to be a mechanical failure, but it wasn’t known whether the engine or the transmission was the source. The make and model of the bus was not mentioned.