Bus coolant leak sends 5 students to hospital in Central Falls

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. (WLNE) — Learning Community Charter students in Central Falls were evacuated from a school bus after a coolant leaked inside, leaving some feeling sick.

The incident happened just after 8 a.m. Friday on Lincoln Avenue.

Fire Chief Scott Mello said that five of the 25 students on the bus were taken to the hospital to be evaluated as a precaution. The rest were checked out on-site.

Mello said a heating coil on the bus had broken, causing antifreeze to spill onto the bus, where it leaked onto some students’ bags.

“This is rare. Usuall,y when there’s a leak, it’s within the engine unit or the heating coil,” Mello said. “But they have rear heating coils in some buses, so the children in the back can stay warm, and it was one of the rear units that let go, and that just filled the whole bus with the smell of the antifreeze and the steam.”

It wasn’t immediately known what caused the heating coil to break.

Classes at the Learning Community Charter have continued and parents were notified of the incident.