School Buses to the Rescue
Poway Unified School District Helps Locals
Evacuate During Recent California Wildfires

POWAY, Calif. — Over 800 elderly and hospitalized residents of the San Diego County town were transported to shelters via the yellow school bus during the California wildfires this past October.

San Diego County firefighters make their way past the yellow buses and into the fray. Photo courtesy Richard Boorman

After the district decided to cancel classes for the week on Sunday evening, Oct. 21, Tim Purvis, the district’s transportation director, contacted his staff to come in to work Monday morning.

"We had fires less than a half a mile to the north/northeast of the facility," said Purvis.

But that didn't stop Purvis' team from showing up for duty, and they spent the next couple of days running buses to shelters around the area and even as far north as Los Angles County.

Twenty- to 45-minute drives turned into three- to six-hour trips. Photo courtesy Richard Boorman

“We could not have done it without these drivers and these school buses. It would have been virtually impossible,” Lorie Shoemaker, chief nurse executive for Palomar Pomerado Health and one of the evacuation decision-makers during the fires. “They were just awesome.”