IC Bus donated $10,000 to Moore Public Schools and more than 800 employees at the company’s Tulsa, Okla., plant filled a donated school bus with essential supplies in response to an EF5 tornado that devastated the area on May 20.
Navistar, the parent company of IC Bus, added another $10,000 donation. The money will go toward the district’s rebuilding efforts. Two elementary schools were flattened and 10 students were killed. IC Bus said Navistar employees worldwide also donated more than $8,000 to the American Red Cross to assist in disaster relief efforts. Meanwhile, the supplies will be donated to the Oklahoma City Salvation Army.
“We understand our donations today will never replace the lives that were lost or even come close to making up for the tragedy suffered by the Moore community,” said Suk Singh, director of manufacturing for IC Bus. “But it is our hope the bus and our donations will serve as a sign that we care about our customers, and that Moore, along with the rest of the state, will recover.”
Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett and IC Bus employees filled the new RE Series school bus destined for Moore Public Schools with school supplies and other essential care items before it left Tulsa.
“This is Tulsa—a city that is generous, community oriented and a city that stands together to help Oklahomans in need,” Bartlett said.
Overall, the Moore tornado killed 24 and injured more than 380. Trent Gibson, state director of student transportation at the Oklahoma Department of Education, said six Moore bus drivers’ homes were destroyed. The IC Bus employees collected essential
The region was hit hard again last week when another EF5 tornado touched down in nearby El Reno, Okla. That twister was the widest on record at 2.6 miles. It killed 20 people, including a volunteer school bus driver for Maple Public School, a pre-kindergarten through eighth-grade district about 25 miles west of Oklahoma City.
Supintendent Art Eccard told STN that William “Billy” O’Neal, 67, was killed when the tornado flipped his car six times. O’Neal had been driving north on Highway 81 from Union City to El Reno when the tornado touched down.
Eccard added that the school district suffered no structural damage but communication into and out of the area was affected.
