OmniRide’s delay in reporting one of its buses stolen led to a lingered police response

WOODBRIDGE — A new report indicates OmniRide could have done more sooner to report a missing bus to police.

The report indicates an unidentified First Transit, Inc. driver contracted by OmniRide drove commuter bus 386 on the afternoon of August 22, 2017, to its first stop at 7th and D streets in NW Washington and refused to pick up any passengers. An angry customer called OmniRide, tipping off the transit company to the problem.

Afterward, OmniRide dispatchers repeatedly tried to contact the driver via an onboard radio with no success. A transit supervisor at the Pentagon was notified of the problem and pursued the bus as it left Washington heading south on Interstate 395.

The supervisor followed the bus assuming that it would return to the OmniRide Transit Center on Potomac Mills Road in Woodbridge, according to the report. But the bus took an unexpected turn, merging onto the Capital Beltway toward Baltimore.

The supervisor stopped following the bus at this point because the bus had been driving erratically, the report states but could have continued the pursuit.

With their bus now headed to Maryland, OmniRide officials knew then it had a critical situation on its hands, according to the report. But it took 37 minutes between the time the driver refused to pick up passengers and the police were called.

At 5:51 p.m., OmniRide dialed Virginia State Police which sent its officers, as well as alerted officers from Alexandria and Fairfax County that responded to the scene to try and stop the bus.

About that time, the driver exited the Beltway onto Telegraph Road in Alexandria, and the “response by police became complicated,” the report states.

The bus pulled back onto the Beltway at 6:09 p.m. and crossed the Woodrow Wilson Bridge into Maryland by 6:24 p.m.

At this point, Maryland State Police had been notified but refused to search for the bus because OmniRide had not reported the bus missing to local authorities at the Prince William County Police Department.

After a report of “unauthorized use” was on file with Prince William police, Maryland authorities were on the case, but by now the bus was north of Baltimore, the report states.

Maryland authorities caught up with the bus near Aberdeen and pursued it for 10 miles north to a toll plaza at Perryville. It was there police surrounded the bus, and the driver surrounded at 8:04 p.m.

A supervisor rode along with the driver in May 2017 and complimented her performance. The transit organization would not say how long driver worked for First Transit.

But the report finds the driver’s actions were not preventable, noting numerous performance issues, to include customer complaints, between June 5, 2017, and the date of her arrest.

However, no single issue was enough to question driver’s performance or to warrant a suspension, which could have only been ordered OmniRide upper management and not dispatchers.

The report states the OmniRide dispatchers had talked to the driver about her performance issues before the bus theft, however, no written record of a disciplinary action exists.

On the night of the theft, dispatchers brought in members of the driver’s family who tried to reach her on the radio in an attempt to convince her to turn around. However, the radio on the bus was later found to be found disabled.

Since the incident, OmniRide has added geofencing technology to its dispatch software that alerts dispatchers when buses travel outside of the regular service area.

The report outlines recommended changes in procedure for OmniRide to include requiring written reports for driver disciplinary issues and to come up with a system to notify police sooner when vehicles go missing.

The report states this incident, as well as a second in December 2017 when another driver drove a bus without permission to Southhampton, Va. where local authorities found the bus on fire, caused “shock” to the system. Both OmniRide and First Transit need to do a better job engaging with its employees, the report notes.