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James Robinson of Diehm's Tire refills a bus tire with air early Tuesday morning, May 18. Vandals flattened tires on 25 buses overnight, delaying the morning routes, according to school officials.
(Eric Crump/Democrat-News)
(Eric Crump/Democrat-News)
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The school day will begin at the regular time and classes will run on their normal schedule, according to Superintendent Craig Noah.
Transportation Director Craig Thompson said 25 buses were affected. Vandals flattened four of six tires on most of the vehicles, he said.
Noah said the district discovered the problem about 5:30 a.m. and was working to get the buses rolling as quickly as possible.
"We've had a lot of help," he said.
In addition to district mechanics, help was received from Diehm's Tire and Marshall Municipal Services.
Contact Eric Crump at marshalleditor@socket.net
Comments
Regarding the question of charges or lack thereof:
Does anyone know if the prosecutor can initiate them on his own; or does the school district have to press charges? If it is a matter of the district having to press charges, then it should be pressed as to why that decision has or hasn't been made to this point. If they are declining to press charges then they need to explain why. As someone mentioned earlier, those are our busses. The board and administration can cut deals at their OWN expense.
ERic,
Wow, why was I deleted?? The community would like answers!!
Thanks
Eric,
Have you found out anything yet???????? We are very anxious to know why they are not being prosecuted.
Thank You
Well Eric,
It has been a week. Had a chance to follow up yet?????????
Eric,
Can you please tell us if there has been a decision reached as to whether or not charges are going to be filed? And if not, can we please be told why???
Thanks
Toes
I guess I don't understand some of the logic on this subject with the bus vandalism. I don't think that many who post on here are actually in tune with reality and the times that we live in. It's not the "good old days" when pranks were fairly tame and maybe in some good natured fun. I get tired of the people who are actually doing what they are supposed to be doing and behaving themselves being the ones who actually get punished-such as not getting to go on field trips, employees having to fix someone elses mess, etc. Kids are kids, and we all know that they don't always make the best decisions. Especially when there are several together. However, there are consequences for doing actions which are against the law. Where is accountability, where is taking responsibiity for your actions, where is doing the right thing because it is what you should be doing? Field trips are a big deal. It is a time that students talk about as they get into high school and say, "Remember when ...." It is when some friendship bonds are made a little stronger as they get to experience other opportunities, and for others it is one of the few chances where they actually get out of Marshall and experience other towns. There's no redo. That is an experience that none of those students will ever get back. There seems to be a lot of differing opinion about the difference between a prank and vandalism. When you are on someone else's land, damaging other people's property, making an inconvenience for people, and possibly putting lives in danger then this an incident that should carry repercussions. Hopefully, it will be dealt with in such a way that the door will not be opened for other classes to try and "out prank." Or will it be a situation where next year's senior class will be held accountable for the actions of their predecessors and threatened from the beginning of the year that certain consequences will happen if they do anything that is deemed a prank. Hopefully, all involved in this episode will learn some important lessons. Sometimes the wait of wondering what is going to happen to you as punishment is a major part of the learning experience.
Honest Opinion,
Why not ask all of the kids who missed their field trips how funny it is????
It is all in WHO did and not WHAT was done.
Good grief,
Have you all not caught on yet????? The first Amendment ONLY applies to people who agree WITH the establishment. I have said it before and I'll say it again..... Liberal agenda, liberal paper, liberal censoring staff!!!!!
a realist
I want to inform you a little. The valve stems were not bothered. The valve core is what was removed. te ait came out of the tire. Now let me explain a valve core. The core screws into the stem like a bolt screws into a nut. The kids simply unscrewed them. The core simply screws back in. That being said. When all the air comes out of a tire that big the tire comes off the rim in some places. To fix this problem there are several methods two of which i know well. one loack an air chuck on the valve stem and spray the wheel down with either then simply throw a match at it, the small explosion of the either pushes the tire back out on the rim and the application of ait keeps it there. method two is a device called a chetta which is a small air tank with a dump valve that you set on the edge of a rim and throw the dump open and the massive amout of air going into the tire at once pushes it out onto the rim. the tires never had to be taken off the bus. im not saying that it didnt cost money im saying that the masses want to punish these kids or young men or men way too extremely. several times i have asked the public by the masses to calm down step back and think about what they have done in this life that may not have been the smartest idea, but no one wants to think about being decent, even the news paper and Eric are going over board as well. everytime i bring up the idea of maybe takeing a couple of steps back and looking at it they erase my comments so that only the views they want to be heard get heard. (They do that in china too). Anyway This is the last comment i will have on the subject. Just for the record I spoke with Mr. Craig Thompson personaly and he said that the tire company helped out so the charges were minimal and we openly laughed about the whole thing. he said it wasnt funny at 530 am when he realized he had been had, but now that it was taken care of rather easily that is was funny. he also said that he wanted the only punishment to be for them to send each one of the boys to the bus barn for about 120 hours and that would more than make up for any exspense the school district had. so good day to all.
I have yet to figure why people continue to back people who have committed a blatant crime. Would it matter if it happened 6 months before or after this? If you think it's funny, it's funny. It's not a $1 valve replacement. Go to any tire company and see what this cost. What are you going to do, buy the valve and superglue it one.
That's why we can't do anything in this town, we're too stupid to realize what's right or wrong and what anything cost.
You're right oldschool. Everyone has an opinion. You have yours & I have mine. No need to get personal...Just agree to disagree.
Any response eric
personal attacks, are disrespectful, threatening, obscene or in other ways objectionable. For some people, but not all.
????????????????? just wondering why some can but others cant ????????????????????
We're going to send these guys over to your place of residence and have them prank you to the tune of $10,000.
what about his one eric
Those who can't tell a prank from vandalism:
What's Your Address? I like to pull pranks too.
WHAT IS THIS ERIC please tell me what was an attack or disrespectful in my post you keep deleteing. i put a lot of good information in them and you delete them but allow this. shame
I might add that yet again they have erased my post. eric are you trying to run me off. i stated nothing out of line in that last post i have worked on these types of tires and i do use the sand. this paper is so one sided it is horrible shame on you eric
Wow really litlemiss? A shattered windshield is the same thing as taking the stem from a tire? A $200 windshild compared to a $1 valve? And unfortunately Slotqueen an 18 year old is an 18 year old! It's not liking handing them a piece of card board automatically makes them mature and grown up, if it did there wouldn't be the college years!!!!!!!
I'm sorry you all were stick in the muds in high school and weren't creative enough to think of a good prank. Obviously you were the parents who had to come up with a different deal to get your kids to work. That does suck, but really this is Marshall, at most it cost you 30 minutes at work and it's not like these other businesses that helped didn't get compensated! I'm sorry you can't take a joke, got to be a boring life. But that is your opinion and very welcome too it, i personally see no issue with this, just have them work for the school (not community service!!) and pay back the school and no harm no foul. Great prank kids. Oh and if the school is so p-oed about this, it's called security, how bout you get some for where you lock your school busses so a group of kids can't walk in and play with all your buses!!!!!!!!
I'm sorry oldschool, but once you graduate, you're an adult, not a kid. Time to act a little more mature! I also agree with LOW, I bet if a "PRANK" like this were pulled at your house, it wouldn't be so funny....
Maybe Honest has a personal connection to the individuals involved???? Sounds like its a little personal to me!
Honest...
The time and manpower from the local businesses that had to come fix the tires isn't free... I know what the charges are, for a FACT!
Oldschool...
I bet that if I came to your house and broke your windshield in your car and called it a prank your view would be a little different!
Are these kids going to held accountable for the lost wages of parents who had to make last minute changes in schedules?
How can you replace the memories the little ones who missed out of field trips?
I don't want to see the kids invoved have a record but LOTS of communtiy service would be fitting start. I hope all who are involved are so scared that they never consider such a prank again.
Just a quick piece of advice to those involved. Time to grow up and be responsible!
$25 dollars a bag. valve cores area about $1 how do we get $65.....did we just make it up?????
So again the guys at the paper erase my post that have nothing wrong in them. so they obveously are showing that they cant stay neutral in the deal. thanks guys glad to see my advertising dollars supporting your views may just have to change that. next the balancing powder is more like a sand that goen in and balance the tire it does not come out when you let the air out. again people talking that dont know what they are talking about. read it while you can because they will erase it by sundown. hypocrates.
This was a great prank. Any prank anyone has ever done cost someone money. The locks where easily fixed so that's not even an issue. As for the tires, ok so there is some powder in them, i gurantee less than 5% of people in Marshall knew that so no kids did either. I'm sure the kids assumed they were just like car tires, people would replace the stems for $2 or whatever and go down the road. Personally i know nothing bout this powder, does it empty out if the tire is flat? Or would it just stay in the tire, then when you re-air and circulates around the tire again, that makes sense to me but again I don't know about it.
The kids don't need community service, they don't need to be arrested or anything like that. It was a flipping prank people! Making them repay is a perfect punishment, whether that's $10k or $100. Just sign them up to a plan and let them repay it. As for kids missing stuff & education, it was no education! I've been on all those field trips and they are just an excuse to kill time the last week of school instead of just watching movies. If your kid missed a field trip, i'm sorry but they'll get over it in 2 days when they are out of school!! Did kids think all this stuff out, of course not THEY ARE KIDS!!!! I still think it's funny and give the kids credit for creativity, quit being old fuddy duddies and remember what it was like to be young and have fun. Eric please don't report names of kids that get caught. Let the kids wash the buses, payback any cost and go on down the road!
Thank you momaster!
Honest Opinion...
I say again... The tires on the buses are filled with Equal Balancing Powder. Equal is a dry polymer that can be injected into the tire directly through the valve stem. Once inside the tire, the Equal graduals are free to distribute themselves around the inside of the tire, responding to force variations which are the result of non-uniformities in the wheel's balance. This stuff is about $25 a bag. One bag per tire. The cost of having to have it put back in and new valve cores is about $65. So lets add this up... That's about $90 per tire. That's not a bad cost for a little prank... oh but wait, it was done to about 105 tires... That's around $9450.00... That's where $10k comes in. And as far as your other about the child molester, that's a different story all together. Maybe it needs to be taken up with the school bord and resolved! But for now we are talking about the vandalism!
My earlier post on this subject--after careful consideration--gives the illusion of me finding this situation humorous. I must confess that I did not realize and had not considered the expense the district would incur as a result. After further educating myself on the matter, I am now sorry that I offered a comparison to my own tomfoolery as a juvenile.
Hey honest,
We're going to send these guys over to your place of residence and have them prank you to the tune of $10,000.
Take the whole idea of it being a senior prank out of any of this. Can you justify it? I would hope not. I hope when you spoke you didn't realize or think of the damage that was done. Senior pranks are funny. This wasn't even close.
And yes they have started bringing people in.
honest opinion....
The tire thing doesn't hurt a thing? Wait until you see the bill the district will have.
Well said Slotqueen!
I hope that the person or persons responsible for this mess get to do some Very Public community service for every kid that missed getting to school on time, for every field trip missed, for every worried parent whose child waited and wondered what went wrong that they didnt get picked up by the bus. If you figure that we have at least 175 students in each grade from k thru 10 that would put this at over 1900 students. Maybe that would be about right for the hours of community service to be repaid to the school district.
There is a difference between a prank & vandalism, and this is vandalism! When you add up the cost to fix all the damages, wages lost/incurred, plus all the things that had to be cancelled, it adds up to VANDALISM!!! Although it hasn't been proven that it was members of the senior class, if it does turn out that it was, I have just a few things for them to think about...! 1)Someone will tell! Don't think you will get away w/it! 2) Remember all the good things that the schools, community, teachers, local businesses, & your parents do for you! One example is something you just experienced...PROJECT GRADUATION! 3) Everytime I go south on 65 highway, I see a huge billboard w/members of the senior class that states "WE CHOOSE KINDNESS...what happened to following that motto?? This was not an act of KINDNESS.
Please keep in mind that I understand nothing has been proven, and if it is, not all of the class was involved. But the class as a whole will be blamed...What a shame!
This is just my opinion!
Way to go municipal services for helping to get the buses going again
Municipal services helped to fix the tires! Not utilities, and it took more than just putting a new valve stem in and air it up. These are not car tires.
9450.00 thats alot of money for our school systems to be paying on this so called (prank)... our schools budget gets cut lower and lower every year and schools are losing valueable materials they need to teach our children and someday the people/kids that did this children is that something they are willing to give up
To everyone that thinks this was a low cost prank, keep this in mind... The tires on the buses are filled with Equal Balancing Powder. Equal is a dry polymer that can be injected into the tire directly through the valve stem. Once inside the tire, the Equal graduals are free to distribute themselves around the inside of the tire, responding to force variations which are the result of non-uniformities in the wheel's balance. This stuff is about $25 a bag. One bag bet tire. The cost of having to have it put back in and new valve cores is about $65. So lets add this up... That's about $90 per tire. That's not a bad cost for a little prank... oh but wait, it was done to about 105 tires... That's around $9450.00... Now were not talking about some cheep fix... Not a prank anymore!
The Lock thing i will agree is no prank cold weld in a lock and it has to be replaced but the tire thing guys dosent hurt a thing. the cold weld in a lock is a bit over the line, but whats done is done calm down
You all are Totally over reacting to this. My Other Comment was Deleted but what ever the paper has its opinion too. calm down
Olivia, good for you. I couldn't agree more.
Prank: An amusing or playful antic. By definition, this was not a prank. It was vandalism. When a person does damage to someone's property, that's crossing the line. Forks in a yard can be removed. TP will degrade and disapear. Saran Wrap can be removed. Glue/soderor a cold weld substance injected into locks and valve stems removed from multiple tires isn't a laughing matter. It gets you the spotlight, but is it the spotlight you desire?
Right on, Olivia! I couldn't agree with you more.
Wow, I don't think we should blame the seniors, because I agree that it may have very well been somebody else. The seniors did the exact same thing to the junior class by destroying their own senior homecoming float and blaming it on the juniors.
But I do believe that whoever did this should be punished with more than washing windows. It was more than just a prank. It was stupidity. I am a 17 year old girl and I don't act like this, why should anyone else be able to do this and get away with it? I think that students in our society should be held to a higher standard than to just be "silly little kids".
This is disrespectful to the school district, the students, and the entire town.
Why was my post removed?
Child endangerment, I bet whoever did this didn't think about the kids that were left standing out there for some time as their parents had probably already left work thinking their childern were safe on a bus on their way to school, instead they were left standing somewhere,confused and disappointed for they were missing activities they were so looking forward to. I agree with Cardfan, if this was the Seniors,their diploma should be revoked until a great amount of community service is spent. 15yrs or so ago I did pranks, but I never did anything that amounted in destroying property.
While I do think that the "prank" was wrong, I also think placing blame is wrong too. Who says that this happened at the hands of the senior class?? Come on, I think we should all be adult to know when things like this happen you may never know the truth. Let's face it what a great time for under classmen to pull something knowing that it is a good time because the out going seniors will take the blame. Maybe, just maybe, it was a group from a neighboring town and not even a group from Marshall. The fact is we don't know stop acting as if we do.
If this was done at the hands of the 2010 Senior class their diplomas should be revoked until their punishment is served. (i.e. community service)
Just FYI....it was Marshall Municipal Services(Street Dept.) that helped repair this act of ignorance, not MMU.
Does anyone know if there is any servaliece video i know the schools have them and if the lock on the doors was cut they should have that on video as for the buses this may be funny to some but not funny for most there is tons of ways to pull a senior prank but taking the stems out of tires is not it caused alot of problems for alot of people im sure parents was late for work trying to figure out how and when thier child/children was going to get to schoo. I hope future students will think about thier senior pranks through and through and realize who it affects
honestopinion, Are you kidding me? I don't know what your parents taught you, if anything, but mine taught me not to tear up other peoples things.I'm not saying send the one/ones who did this to jail, but they need to be punished! Whether it was a prank or not, there are other ways of pulling a funny,"harmless" prank. Did you not read my last post...MANY students missed out on fieldtrips today also. You must not have children, at least not in school now. This just seems all funny to you, why don't you just put some more ideas out there for them to try next year....get a clue.
Why was my post removed???
Just one more thing! Had someone soaped or waxed the windsheilds of the busses and done it correctly it would have taken just as long to scape it off and clean it to a point that it would have been safe for the bus to continue. Everyone just CALM DOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!
theobserver
You are 100% right! This is no police matter.
CWilli
The cost is minimal for the internal parts to a valve stem. If I understand correctly all they did was take those out. This is a Harmless way to flatten a tire. It causes no damage to the tire on the bus, you put another one in and with about three turns of the tool it is fixed just add air. If you cant see it that way im sure you never did anything wrong as a kid or adult or middleage person, and im sure your kids (if you have any) have never done anything wrong either. Everyone relax take a deep breath and say D@mn it Kids. I can Promise you that Mr. Craig Thompson didnt think this was funny this morning but in the same breath i can promise you that he also knew the trick well or some other ones kinda like it. The reason Diehm's and Mun. Utilities came in is because it takes a lot of air to air up that many tires and they both have trucks with compressors that they can drive rite up to the bus and air up the tire.
Lets face it id be a liar if i said i havent ever used that exact trick on a halloween night or two. good luck to all the 2010 Seniors, and lets hope that they catch the people that did this and yes we can get some good bus cleaning out of them.
Well if it was a bunch of high schoolers they got what they wanted , 15 min. of fame . I hope there proud of themselves becuase to the rest of the town they look like a bunch of idiots . I'm not impressed with there handy work and I do hope someone rats them out . Maybe there parents can help pay back the damage they have done .
A prank is supposed to be funny. Cutting time away from education is not funny. Taking money away from schools and local businesses is not funny.
I have children that go to Marshall Public Schools and I would expect my child to be punished. These were seniors in high school, obviously we as a society and those at the school have not taught them that there are consequences for our behavior.
observer,
Since when do you have call in a tire company and MMU employees for a silly prank. Soaping a window is a prank. Teepeeing a house is a prank. Forking a yard is a prank.
Damaging the tires on 20-30 buses is vandalism. People wonder why those in education get frustrated. The best way the senior class could thank the school district is to damage it and shut it down.
I heard that there was a sign or something left that said "Class of 2010"....has anyone else heard?
theobserver
Where is it stated it was teenager(s) who vandalize the buses. To whomever it is, He/they/she should be prosecuted and pay for the cost of the repair (labor and material)
This is not a laughing matter. If one does this type action now, what will one do in the future.
It sounds like a silly prank that caused a lot of extra work. I don't think that it ought to be a police matter. I think all the grown ups out there ought to remember being teenagers. The stories that I hear from people in their 40's, 50's and 60's if we would have prosecuted them we would probably all be criminals. If you find out who did it, I am sure Craig has some busses to wash.
It wouldn't be prudent or wise to endorse vandalism any where--especially in these blogs. And I wouldn't do that.
But.
This brings back a few memories. I'm fairly certain that me and the hooligans I used to include in my social circle as a youngun' are the reason that First Aid kits on school buses were put under lock and key for a while.
Anyone know what Ipecac is? Hehehe.
Very kind of the local businesses to lend a hand in getting the buses on the road.
I just wanted to say that I hope they find out who did this, it's very sad. Take pride in your town and schools! All the students who missed out on field trips today and all the trouble that all the drivers had to go through is uncalled for. I hope that whoever did this now sees that they did more that just flatten a few tires. They made alot of worthy students miss out on a fun-filled, educational day and left many younger students waiting and wondering about their buses. *Mainly I wanted to commend Mr. Craig Thompson for what a wonderful job he does for our transportation department!* I also think it's great that the guys from Diehm's and Mun. Utilities helped out...way to go! I even saw one bus driver picking up kids not normally on his route to get them to school...teamwork. Good job to everyone for all the extra effort and hard work this morning!
The locks on all of the exterior doors of the high school were vandalized. I hope they find who did these things and prosecute...throw the book at them!
Are you kidding me? What an awful thing to do.
It was rumored that something was done at one of the schools as well...any word on that?