Catatonic Driver

From Michael:

My partner and I got on the S2 on April 7 (bus #6466) at about 6:25 p.m. in front of the Capitol Hilton (16th and L stop).

My partner swiped his card, and the machine beeped. Nothing. He swiped it again. Nothing.

He asked the bus driver if he needed to add money.

The driver mumbled something incoherent.

My partner and I looked at each other like, what the hell.

So he swiped a few more times, and then asked the driver for help in adding money.

The driver just stared off into space.

Finally, my partner put a $10 bill in the machine, which registered, but didn't get added to his card.

My partner asked the driver again for some help.

The driver continued to stare off in space.

He was wearing sunglasses, by the way.

We looked to the other people on the bus, who were also wondering what the hell was going on.

Some of them looked like they are blaming us, but the ones in the front and who could see the rear view mirror could see that the bus driver was catatonic.

Finally, we took seats, since he clearly was not responsive. At this point, I was unsure if he was going to be able to drive, but he did, and it was fine.

At the next stop, more people got on, and one more person needed to add money to their card. She tried to work the machine, to no avail, and asked the driver for help.

Again, no response. Just more staring off into space.

She finally asked someone for some coins, put in some money and sat down.

The people in the front of the bus were just looking at each other, wondering what was going on.

We took the bust to our stop, and there, at 16th and U, we saw a police car. We explained the story to the officer, told him the bus number and the driver's name. He immediately, turned on the lights and stormed up 16th St. Minutes later, 5 more squad cars tore up 16th.

It must have been about 6:40, and I would think the cops would have caught up to him around 16th and Euclid.

I don't know what happened after that, but would appreciate if anyone else knows what happened.

Metro had no report, they said.

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