A T bus driver saved the riders on her bus from potential injury Tuesday night when a passenger climbed over her and turned the wheel into oncoming traffic.
“He grabbed me by the neck,” bus driver Sharina Byrd said to the dispatcher after the incident. “I’m too shaken to drive right now.”
The frightening ride took place about 7:30 p.m. as the Route 86 bus traveled along Chestnut Hill Avenue in Brighton.
Donald Lyons, 52, of Everett, allegedly reached over the driver and with both hands took hold of the wheel and turned it left, causing the bus to swerve into oncoming traffic, according to a police report.
The driver was able to apply the emergency brake and avoid a collision.
Lyons fled. Passengers giving descriptions to police told them when “the male stood up his pants were falling down, which revealed half of his buttocks.”
A passenger walking home after the incident noticed him down the road and alerted T police.
“I asked the suspect to stand up and as he did I observed his pants had fallen down exposing half his buttocks,” the officer wrote in the report.
Lyons pleaded not guilty during his arraignment yesterday and was ordered held on $10,000 bail.
Byrd, who has two months on the job, was treated at the scene for minor injuries.
