WHAT'S NEW (Saturday June 10, 2000)
I learned of some big news this week. And it is BIG!! The MDTA has placed a Godzilla- sized order from NABI for 642 new low- floors. Tha's SIX HUNDRED AND FOURTY TWO. Of course this order is spread out over five years, but the first 80 are arriving in January. I'm betting that these are meant to replace at least the 7000's that are left, which I believe number around 80.
Minor correction: the accident with 7052 happened in the pre-dawn hours on Friday. The news footage made it hard to tell which direction the twilight was coming from. And I first heard about it on the Rick Sanchez report at 10 PM....7052 vanished for a while. I might have gone to Central to get the front panels repaired, since at that time the CW body shop was finishing up it's work with 9019. The bus is back, and if you look at it from the front, you'd think 7052 was brand new. The front panels are still in the old livery, but with new green and blue stripes. And the fake louvres on the front of the bus have been painted black.
The most bizzarre accident befell 9010 last weekend. The bus was nailed by, of all things, a bulldozer!! The rear windows on the door side were all broken, as were the back doors and the two windows ahead of the doors.
More wierdness: As 7111 was returning to NE on Wednesday afternoon, it stalled. Problem was, it stalled in the intersection of MIami Gardens Dr. and NE 2 Court. As it was making a left onto 2nd. The bus wound up blocking the westbound lanes of MGD (NE 183 St.) for a while until a tug came out of the NE garage, which occupies, appropriately enough, the Northeast corner of the intersection, and pushed it out of the intersection and into the garage.
And then on rainy, miserable Thursday, two accidents happened on PA's minibuses. In the morning, 6038 was rear-ended by a car while on the Killian KAT going eastbound. The entire left half of the back bumper was pushed down into a grotesque shape, which suggests it was hit by a big SUV or something. In the evening, 6005, on the westbound Kendall KAT, was rear-ended by a whopping three cars. Car 1 skidded into car 2, which hit car 3, which hit the bus. No one was injusred, but the three cars were totalled. But 6005 suffered no visible damage(!!).
NE has painted it's retired buses all white- 7060 and 7109 are among the bunch. Also, the vanished 7121 has turned up. It's running out of NE now after it's brief stay at CW.
I've added pages on route 88 and route J.
What's New (Sunday June 4, 2000)
Welcome to the 2000 Hurricane Season!!
I've added another section to this site. It tells the story of buses that were lost due to fires or other problems. Click here to go there.
I'm trying to figure out just why the links to the pictures on the front page are all blue. When I work on them the links are different colors, but when it saves they save blue.
On Tuesday we were hit by a nasty round of storms. Because of these storms I wound up discovering that 7054's Channel 23 wrap has been peeled off. It went like this... during the evening I was on the Busway Local with bus # 6027. The afternoon had been a bit stormy, but the real action began at 7:30 that evening. Beginning then, and lasting until 8:45, the Cutler Ridge area was sacked with a nasty thunderstorm. I missed the start of the action, since I was heading northbound to Dadeland South. But when I returned, It was like driving into Biscayne Bay, the streets were so flooded. Well, I returned to CW after 10 at night. The bus lot had flooded out, too. The water came up past my ankles as I sloshed over to a waiting minibus (6004) that was shuttling drivers across the lot. It was raining very hard and lightning was hitting all around the garage. It knocked out power to the shops and the gas pumps for a while. I spent a while at the dispatch office wringing out my socks and drying out, while outside the storms continued at full throttle. Well, I decided to set out for my car, which was at the far end of the parking lot. I half walked and half waded but I finally got there. I drove to the main entrance to get my things. I left my car, and whe I came back I discovered that I had locked myself out of my car. So I went, slipping and sliding, to the shop to get a slim-jim. While I was in there I came across 7054, which had just been stripped. Crumpled up parts of the big sticker were still lying around. It looks funny since the front panels are in the new livery while the rest of the bus is in the old 'M' livery. Well, with the security guard's help, I got into my car and went home.
A couple of buses have had ugly accidents... 1904 is the first Blue Bird to be KO'd by a wreck. The bus was on the Bird Road MAX a few mornings ago. The bus left the west end of the line, and headed down 147th Avenue, when it suddenly and inexplicablyly went onto the median and took out 3 palm trees. The driver was the only one on board, and thankfully only had minor injuries. The cause is still a mystery. The bus' front end was badly bashed up, and it is in the shop being repaired.
On Friday evening a car hit 7052 at Coral Way and 127 Avenue. The car hit a wall, and 7052 careened onto the median. No one, thankfully, was seriously hurt. The bus was on Flagler MAX.
9344 has been wrapped for Lucky Jeans. One of NE's 9200's has also gotten this wrap. And 9430's Amor 107.5 wrap has been replaced by a wrap for Nike. And the Truth campaign has put baby wraps on 7007, 7009 and 7010.
7002, 7017, 7023, 7026, 7036, 7045, 7046, and 8024 have been painted white.