Middle school students steer bus to safety after driver’s asthma attack

A routine school run turned into a test of emergency readiness when Hancock Middle School students took control of their bus after driver Leah Taylor, 46, suffered an asthma attack and blacked out before she could reach her medication. About 40 children were on board when the bus left Hancock Middle School in Hancock County on Wednesday, April 23, and the incident was caught on camera.

Jackson Casnave, 12, was sitting directly behind Taylor when he saw the bus begin to swerve. He moved quickly to steer the vehicle while Darrius Clark, 12, hit the brakes and helped guide the bus onto a median and into park. Clark’s 13-year-old sister, eighth grader Kayleigh Clark, ran to the front and called 911. Destiny Cornelius, 15, an eighth grader, administered Taylor’s nebulizer medicine, while sixth grader McKenzy Finch, 13, held Taylor’s head and called the district transportation team from the driver’s ringing phone. The children stayed with Taylor and kept the bus under control until first responders arrived.

Taylor said she has made a full recovery and said the students saved her life and everyone else on the bus. The response also highlighted how fast a school transportation emergency can escalate, and how much depended on children who were able to recognize danger, make decisions under pressure and use the tools in front of them. In this case, the most basic safeguards mattered: braking the bus, calling emergency services, reaching district transportation staff and getting medication to the driver before help arrived.

Hancock Middle School principal Dr. Melissa Saucier praised the students for staying calm and acting swiftly, saying the emergency could have been detrimental. The school honored the five students at a pep rally on Friday and planned a lunch field trip next week to a restaurant of their choosing. The episode drew national attention because it echoed a similar case in Warren, Michigan, in April 2023, when seventh grader Dillon Reeves helped stop a school bus after the driver lost consciousness. In that case, no one was hurt, and the driver was hospitalized and recovering.