School bus emergency? Fairfax County students have a plan to handle it

This story is part of WTOP’s 2026 Back to School coverage.

The wheels on the bus will soon be going round and round again in Fairfax County, Virginia, and some of its young riders are learning what to do if there’s an emergency on the way to school.

The annual Safety Patrol Training Camp, hosted by Fairfax County Public Schools’ Office of Transportation Services, combined hands-on exercises with classroom lessons to teach students how to keep calm during emergencies on buses.

The training can feel remarkably realistic, with overturned school buses on their side or completely upside down in the middle of the county bus depot. Other buses, right side up, fill with smoke that is water-based but mimics the intensity of a bus overheating.

Sangster Elementary School fifth grader Kevin said the simulation was “a little scary.” He volunteered to lead his classmates off the smoke-filled bus by shouting “scoot, slide” to help students safely dismount from the window of the vehicle onto the ground below.

He ultimately told himself not to be scared.

“You just try to focus on saving the people and yourself,” he said.

Keeping calm is a big takeaway from the lesson, one the school district’s senior operations manager for ...