A bus driver has been sacked after dramatic CCTV footage emerged showing a 12-year-old boy pinned to the outside of a moving public bus and dragged through the streets. <\/p>\n
The footage captures the ordeal, which began when the schoolboy, Nathaniel, exited the bus on Wheelers Hill around 8am on March 16. <\/p>\n
Before he could fully exit, the bus door closed, trapping his school bag and right arm inside.<\/p>\n
The bus then continued on its route, dragging a helpless Nathaniel along Brandon Park Drive for about 350 metres until the driver realised what was happening. <\/p>\n
The Herald Sun understands fellow commuters on the bus screamed at the driver to stop when they noticed him hanging on.<\/p>\n
Nathaniel\u2019s mother, Grace Pan, took to social media to express her anger at the incident, saying it was a miracle her son escaped injury. <\/p>\n
\u201cNathaniel had to lift his legs off the road and hang on with his right hand to the inner door rail while passing parked cars just centimetres away,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe now suffers from anxiety and is no longer confident to catch the bus by himself.\u201d <\/p>\n
Nathaniel is now seeing a psychologist over the trauma. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen he sees a bus, he says his hands shake uncontrollably, as a mum would you not feel upset and also helpless?\u201d Ms Pan asked. <\/p>\n
She lashed out at operators Ventura Bus Lines, saying it had showed a lack of accountability over the incident.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs his primary caregiver, I am not entitled to any support from TAC (Transport Accident Commission) or Ventura Bus Lines for the trauma, financial burden and disruption this accident has caused me and our family,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
\u201cVentura has simply referred us to TAC despite knowing that as a minor with no physical injury or loss of income, our entitlements are limited to our out-of-pocket psychologist expenses. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere has been no acknowledgment of the safety failures \u2026 and zero incident transparency.\u201d<\/p>\n
In an email sent by Ventura to Nathaniel\u2019s mother, Ventura apologised for \u201cnot delivering a service to your expectations\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is disappointing to hear you have experienced poor service delivery and I appreciate the opportunity to improve our service,\u201d Ventura said. <\/p>\n
Premier Jacinta Allan said she had directed TAC Minister Ben Carroll to ensure the family was supported following the \u201cshocking\u201d incident. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve asked him to direct the TAC to reach out to the family to see what further support can be provided, because while thankfully, that young boy wasn\u2019t physically injured, it\u2019s clearly had an impact,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
\u201cEvery parent wants to make sure their child gets to school safely, and that footage was just a shocking incident, and my thoughts are with that young boy and his family.\u201d <\/p>\n
A Ventura spokesperson said: \u201cFollowing a full investigation into this incident, and internal disciplinary procedures, the driver\u2019s employment has been terminated.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A bus driver has been sacked after dramatic CCTV footage emerged showing a 12-year-old boy pinned to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[300651,63,689,300652,300649,300654,288568,43,27237,300655,647,197901,44,300653,677,300648,300645,300646,300650,136720,1314,184249,41,39,42,40,53462,660,300052,300647],"class_list":{"0":"post-620007","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-accident-commission","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-australia-and-new-zealand","11":"tag-bus-door","12":"tag-bus-lines","13":"tag-distressing-footage","14":"tag-dramatic-footage","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-herald-sun","17":"tag-inner-door-rail","18":"tag-melbourne","19":"tag-nathaniel","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-notorious-youth-gang","22":"tag-oceania","23":"tag-physical-injury","24":"tag-police-sting","25":"tag-safety-failures","26":"tag-school-commute","27":"tag-service-delivery","28":"tag-social-media","29":"tag-the-herald","30":"tag-top-news","31":"tag-top-stories","32":"tag-topnews","33":"tag-topstories","34":"tag-ventura","35":"tag-victoria","36":"tag-wheelers-hill","37":"tag-zero-incident-transparency"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=620007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=620007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=620007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=620007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}