PITTSBURGH -- School districts are supposed to be conducting evacuation drills on school buses this month.

Pennsylvania law requires those drills happen twice a year, including once in March.

But a Team 4 investigation raises questions about how well kids are being trained to escape a bus in an emergency.

Investigative reporter Jim Parsons took a look at the situation. What follows is a transcript of his report that first aired March 8, 2010, on WTAE Channel 4 Action News at 5 p.m.

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From our conversations with students and school officials, there's not one uniform evacuation drill that every district conducts. And no one is checking to make sure districts do it a certain way. So it isn't surprising that some kids have no idea what to do in an emergency.

Jan. 21, 2010: A school bus slides down an embankment during a Riverside, Calif., mud slide. Fifty junior high school students escape through the rear emergency door.

Oct. 13, 2001: A school bus carrying members of a high school marching band plunges off a bridge in Omaha, Neb., into a creek 60 feet below, killing four students and injuring more than 20 others. An investigative report issued years later by the National Transportation Safety Board found the kids had no idea how to open the emergency hatch in the bus roof. No one had ever shown them.

Here in Pennsylvania, school districts are required to teach kids, twice a year, how to escape from a bus in an emergency. The law is clear: school bus evacuation drills "shall include the practice and instruction concerning the location, use and operation of emergency exit doors and fire extinguishers."

Jim Parsons: "You started riding a school bus at the beginning of this year. Did anybody show you how to use this fire extinguisher?"

Nico Regoli, High School Student: "No."

Jim Parsons: "Did anybody show you how to get in an out of that bus using the emergency doors?"

Cody Sawhook, High School Student: "No."

School district officials where these students attend say they have conducted drills showing kids how to use emergency exits on school buses, but not fire extinguishers. They say they believe it's best to train adults how to use them instead.

Jim Parsons: "Did you ever notice that there is one of these on your school bus?"

Adam Kissell, High School Student: "I never really noticed that at all, no.

Jim Parsons: "You mean no one has ever shown you that there is a fire extinguisher or how to use it?"

Adam Kissell, High School Student: "They've shown me safety exits but never a fire extinguisher or how to use it. Period."

And Adam says his school bus driver doesn't allow students to practice opening the emergency exits during the evacuation drills. She just points to them. District officials where Adam attends school did not return our calls.

Jim Parsons: "If you had an emergency on your school bus that you ride every day and you had to open that door in the roof, would you know how to do it?"

Adam Kissell, High School Student: "Not at all."

Jim Parsons: "So if I asked you how to use this right now, would you have any idea?"

Morgan Isles, Student: 'I think."

These Beaver County twins who ride a school bus every day say they remember having a training and they though they knew how to use a fire extinguisher. But when I hand them one...

Jim Parsons: "So nobody showed you that you have to pull this pin out first?"

Donna Isles, Beaver County Parent: "I think its terrifying, I really do. I think it's terrifying that they don't know how to use it. If there was a fire and they couldn't get out and they didn't know how to use the emergency exits or how to use the fire extinguisher, then that's not a good scenario. And I thank you for bringing that to my attention."

Team 4 checked with the Pennsylvania Department of Education and discovered every school district certifies annually that they have completed the school bus evacuation drills. But no one asks exactly what that means.

Jim Parsons: "Does the district have a checklist of all of the things that the kids have to be shown?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "The carriers do this. They have a list."

But that list doesn't include allowing students to practice using the fire extinguishers.

Jim Parsons: "Has anyone ever shown you how to use one of these?"

James Chapman, Brashear High School Student: "No."

Brashear High School student James Chapman had no idea how to use a fire extinguisher, so we showed him.

Jim Parsons: "Go ahead and pull that pin out. Now hold hose up, aim hose."

Now James knows how to use an extinguisher, but he still has no idea how to open the emergency hatch in the roof of a school bus.

James Chapman, Brashear High School Student: "Just the door in the back."

Jim Parsons: "If you had to open the one in the roof, would you know how?"

James Chapman, Brashear High School Student: "No."

That's because Pittsburgh Public Schools doesn't include the roof hatch in its evacuation drills.

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "Its not really hard to open an emergency door. Lift the lever, push it out."

Jim Parsons: "What about the one in the roof?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools:"That's not in the evacuation; that's not in the evacuation."

Jim Parsons: "That's not in the evacuation drill?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools:"No it's not."

Jim Parsons: "Why not? It's in the law."

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "No it's not in the law."

Because state law specifically mentions emergency exit doors, Vasser says that doesn't include a requirement to train students how to use an emergency exit hatch. And remember that fatal bus crash in Nebraska? The roof hatch was the only way out but the students didn't know how to use it.

Jim Parsons: "Are you confident, Ted, that in a disaster situation, school bus goes down an embankment, kids have to get out, that your kids know how to get out of these buses?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "Yeah, I'm pretty confident. I'm pretty sure they know how to get out."

But a member of the state legislature's House Education Committee says being "pretty sure" isn't good enough.

Rep. Chelsa Wagner, D-Brookline: "God forbid something happen in a school bus, but if it does we need to make sure our kids are prepared and know what to do."

Rep. Wagner says she'll look into amending state law so it's more specific about what districts have to do to train students during those evacuation drills.

Part 2

School districts are supposed to be conducting evacuation drills on school buses this month. Pennsylvania law requires those drills happen twice a year, including once in March. But a Team 4 investigation raises questions about how well kids are being trained to escape a bus in an emergency.

What follows is a transcript from Jim Parsons' report that first aired March 8, 2010, on WTAE Channel 4 Action News at 11 p.m.

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Video:Watch Part 2 Of Jim's Report

It's a comprehensive inspection covering every corner of a school bus -- from the sidearm stop signs to the emergency hatch in the roof to the brakes underneath -- and school districts and bus companies get plenty of time to prepare for the annual inspection.

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "We announce them several months beforehand. They know when we're coming. We set a date for them when we're going to be there and they're ready for us."

Jim Parsons: "If they know you are coming, shouldn't everything pass with flying colors?"

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "It should, yeah."

Jim Parsons: "But it doesn't?"

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "Sometimes no."

In Allegheny County last year, state police safety inspections turned up 612 violations on school buses, including 27 for red and amber eight-way stop lamps, 20 for faulty fire extinguishers, six for tires and 67 for brake systems.

Parsons reported that state police were willing to provide the numbers, but not the actual inspection reports, and that some school districts don't even have them.

Jim Parsons: "School bus inspection reports, do you have any?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "No."

Vasser serves as director of student transportation for Pittsburgh Public Schools.

Pittsburgh Public Schools contracts with 14 different school bus companies, each of them getting copies of state police inspection reports, but the district does not.

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "I'll give them to the mechanic or manager of the building."

Jim Parsons: "But a copy doesn't go to the school district that they are driving for?"

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "It should."

Jim Parsons: "But not from state police?"

Trooper Frank Delano, Pennsylvania State Police: "No, we don't give them. We keep our copy and make a copy, and they either keep it here on file at the building or to the school district."

But in Pittsburgh, contractors don't send them to the school district.

Jim Parsons: "Why don't you have those reports?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "The reports are not given to us by the state troopers, they never have been."

Jim Parsons: "Why don't you ask your contractors for those reports?"

Theodore Vasser, Pittsburgh Public Schools: "I have and a lot of our contractors don't have copies of those reports."

Rep. Chelsa Wagner, D-Brookline: "I'd like to see the school districts demanding those. I think that's the immediate resolution."

Wagner is a member of the state legislature's House Education Committee. She said she's concerned about inspection reports not being shared with anyone besides the private companies that own the school buses.

Rep. Chelsa Wagner, D-Brookline: "We need to make sure that information is getting in the right hands, and if it is only going to the private company, only for their eyes, it's not getting before the people who really need to see it."

Wagner said all school districts should demand those inspection reports from their private contractors and make them available to parents when they ask for them.

Read The Right-To-Know Letter: Why State Police Won't Give Records To WTAE

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