5.2 Fires, Evacuation, and Post-Crash Procedures
Key Takeaways
- ELDT Unit C1.1: after a crash, if possible, assess your own physical condition immediately and notify authorities, or assign that task to a passenger or others at the scene, then obtain emergency medical assistance.
- In a minor crash, move the bus off the road when you can do so safely to avoid a subsequent crash; engage flashers and place reflective triangles or other warning devices.
- For an on-board fire, stop in a safe place if possible, evacuate through the exit away from the fire, account for riders, use an extinguisher only if trained and the fire is small, and never re-enter a burning coach for belongings.
- 49 CFR 392.22 is the general CMV stopped-vehicle rule: flashers immediately, then triangles typically within 10 minutes at about 10 ft / 100 ft / 100 ft, or the divided-highway variant of about 10 ft at the rear plus 100 ft and 200 ft toward traffic.
- For fights, weapons, or medical emergencies, stop only where you will not create a second crash, radio dispatch and 911 as needed, and do not leave the coach sitting in a live travel lane to 'handle it.'
5.2 Fires, Evacuation, and Post-Crash Procedures
Quick answer: After a crash, if you can, check yourself first, then notify authorities or assign a passenger to do it, get medical help, move a minor-crash bus off the road when that is safe, light the flashers, set triangles, and use an extinguisher only on a fire you are trained to fight. For an on-board fire, stop in a safe place if possible, evacuate through the exit away from the fire, account for riders, and never go back into a burning coach for belongings.
49 CFR 383.117(a)(3) requires Passenger endorsement applicants to know proper responses to fires and unruly passengers. Entry-Level Driver Training Appendix C turns that into two classroom units: C1.1 Post-Crash Procedures and C1.2 Other Emergency Procedures. The knowledge test is not asking for a speech. It is asking whether your first moves prevent the second crash and get people off a burning or wrecked coach.
C1.1 After the crash
If you are conscious, assess your own physical condition immediately. A driver who is bleeding, concussed, or trapped cannot run a full evacuation and should not pretend otherwise. Notify police and emergency medical services, or assign that task to a passenger or to other people already at the scene. Point to a specific person, give them the location, and tell them to report a bus crash with an approximate passenger count. "I thought someone else called" is not a procedure.
Obtain emergency medical assistance for injured riders. Stay inside your training: severe bleeding, keep people warm, and do not move a rider with a suspected spine injury unless the bus is on fire or sitting unprotected in a live lane.
In a minor crash, move the bus off the traveled way when you can do so without making injuries worse. A coach sitting in a travel lane invites the second crash, which is often the event that kills people who survived the first impact. If the bus cannot be moved, or if moving it would harm the injured, protect the scene where it sits.
Engage the hazard flashers at once. Place reflective triangles and any other required warning devices. Use a fire extinguisher if a small fire is actually present and you are trained to use it. Do not empty the bottle into a closed engine compartment "just in case," and do not fight a fire that has already involved the passenger space.
C1.2 Other emergencies while you are still on the trip
Unit C1.2 covers security breaches, on-board fires, emergency-exit and passenger evacuation, medical emergencies, emergency stopping (including hazard signals), and mechanical breakdowns or defects en route. The common thread is the same: get the coach out of the path of following traffic when you can, communicate, and use the exits you already know from Section 5.1.
Mechanical breakdown. Four-way flashers first. If you are on the traveled portion or the shoulder of a highway, you are in 49 CFR 392.22 territory—the general CMV stopped-vehicle rule, not a passenger-only invention. Radio dispatch. Do not tow or push a loaded bus farther than the nearest safe place to discharge riders, and only when having them stay aboard would be worse.
Security breach or suspicious item. Do not open a bag you believe is a device. Stop if you can do so without creating a second crash, keep riders away from the item, and follow carrier and law-enforcement direction.
Bus fire and evacuation sequence
Engine, tire, wheel-well, and electrical fires on a coach can travel the body faster than a driver expects. Use this sequence:
- Recognize smoke, heat, or a confirmed fire.
- Get off the throttle, signal, and stop in a safe place if you can still reach a shoulder, lot, or wide roadside. Do not stop in a tunnel, on a grade crossing, or in a left-lane pocket if you still have a better option.
- Shut down per carrier procedure (engine off, to cut fuel and electrical feed) when you can do that without delaying the evacuation.
- Order an evacuation through the exit away from the fire. If the rear engine compartment is burning, the front service door may be the primary opening. If the front is involved, send people to the rear door and the push-outs on the cold side.
- Keep the flow moving. Assign a capable rider to help at the door. Use roof hatches if the coach is not upright.
- Move people well off the road and upwind of smoke. Account for riders against a trip sheet or a last visual sweep from the doorway—not from inside a burning cabin.
- Use the extinguisher only if you are trained, the fire is small, you have an escape path, and fighting it will not delay getting people off. Pull the pin, aim at the base, squeeze, sweep. A fully involved engine or a fire already in the passenger space is an evacuation problem, not a hero problem.
- Never go back into a burning coach for belongings, instruments, phones, or a cash drop.
Fights, weapons, and medical events: stop without a second crash
Where you may discharge a disruptive rider is taught with loading and stop rules in other chapters. This chapter is about not turning a fight or a medical emergency into a second crash.
If riders are fighting, keep both hands on the driving task until you can leave the travel lane. A panic stop in the middle of an interstate, a stop on railroad tracks, or a stop just beyond a crest where following traffic cannot see you can kill more people than the fight will. Radio dispatch. Call 911 when a weapon, a serious injury, or a threat you cannot control is involved. Pull onto a shoulder, a lighted lot, or another place where the coach is not a stationary target in a live lane. Then deal with the people.
A medical emergency (collapse, seizure, childbirth, severe allergic reaction) uses the same road logic: flashers, a safe stop, 911, first aid within your training, and an evacuation only if the bus itself is unsafe. Do not put an unconscious rider out on a dark rural shoulder "to get them off the bus" if the coach is the safer shelter until EMS arrives.
Warning devices: 49 CFR 392.22 (general CMV rule)
Whenever a commercial motor vehicle is stopped on the traveled portion or the shoulder for any cause other than a necessary traffic stop, activate the hazard flashers immediately and keep them flashing until the warning devices are placed, and again when you pick the devices up. Place the devices as soon as possible, and in any event within 10 minutes.
Typical two-way roadway placement with bidirectional reflective triangles:
| Device | Placement under the general CMV stopped-vehicle rule |
|---|---|
| First | Traffic side, about 10 feet (4 paces) from the vehicle, toward approaching traffic |
| Second | About 100 feet (40 paces) toward approaching traffic, center of the lane or shoulder you occupy |
| Third | About 100 feet (40 paces) away from approaching traffic, center of that same lane or shoulder |
Divided or one-way highway variant: one device on the traffic side within about 10 feet of the rear; one about 100 feet toward approaching traffic; one about 200 feet toward approaching traffic.
If you are stopped within 500 feet of a hill, curve, or other view obstruction, place the device in that direction far enough (100 to 500 feet) that approaching drivers actually get a warning. Placement is generally not required in a business or residential district of a municipality except when headlights are required and street lighting will not make the CMV visible at 500 feet. Do not put a flame-producing fusee next to leaking fuel.
Memorize these distances as 49 CFR 392.22, the general stopped-CMV rule, not as a Passenger-only trick.
Immediately after a crash, ELDT Unit C1.1 requires which first move if the driver is able to act?
Smoke is coming from the rear engine area of a motorcoach. Which evacuation and fire-fighting choice is correct?
A passenger-carrying CMV is stopped on the shoulder of a two-way highway. Under 49 CFR 392.22, the typical bidirectional-triangle pattern is which of the following?