A school bus driver in Alabama and another in Minnesota were arrested with blood alcohol (BAC) levels that were several times the allowed limit for CDL holders who are on duty.
Related: Authorities Address Recent School Bus Driver DUIs
Mark Pierce, a 58-year-old who drives for Hoover City Schools in Alabama, drove off the road and crashed his empty school bus into some woods on the afternoon of Jan. 31. State troopers and Hoover police responded to the accident and determined Pierce to be under the influence of alcohol. His BAC was 0.15, almost four times the state’s legal limit of 0.04.
On Feb. 5, the Sauk Centre School District’s transportation department in central Minnesota received three calls complaining about a bus carrying over 50 students and driven by 63-year-old Thomas R. Bromen. Two calls were from daycare centers expecting students that Bromen did not drop off, and one call was from a truck driver who witnessed the bus run a red light and almost run him off the road.
The driver admitted to Transportation Director Jon Fevig that he was drunk and police were called. Over three hours after Bromen had come into work that afternoon, a breath test at police headquarters revealed that his BAC was 0.16. Minnesota law prohibits drivers from operating a school bus “when there is physical evidence present in the person’s body of the consumption of any alcohol.”
Both drivers were later fired from their jobs. This is the eighth incident this school year of school bus drivers illegally driving students while intoxicated.
