Coburg kids defy driver and stop school bus to rescue teen after bike fall

COBURG students on their school bus didn’t take no for an answer when they spotted a girl lying unconscious on a busy road after crashing her bike.

Students from Mercy College Coburg with Erica from Coburg High School. Picture: Mark Dadswell

COBURG students on their school bus didn’t take no for an answer when they spotted a girl lying unconscious on a busy road after crashing her bike.

The nasty fall could have been much worse for Erica if not for her helmet and the group of determined high school students who saw her crash.

When Mercy College Year 7 student Natasha saw Erica crash her bike on Renown St while riding home recently, she asked her bus driver to stop so she could help.

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“The bus driver said the other bus behind him could deal with it, and we told him no and demanded to get off,” Natasha said.

Coburg High student Erica, 14, had been knocked out and was slowly regaining consciousness as Natasha and fellow students Angelica, Amal, Doha, Dounia and Rayan jumped off the bus, ran over to help and called an ambulance.

Erica, who said she didn’t remember falling from the bike and “couldn’t register any faces”, was comforted by the girls, who also phoned her parents immediately.

“Dounia spoke to me and she was just so calm and collected … for them to stop the bus and get off and know what to do, they did a brilliant job of it,” Erica’s mother, Karin Sitte-Meagher said.

“I was really confused,” Erica said. “I was more worried about making it to circus training and that my phone had smashed.”

While she suffered a fractured right wrist and will be out of circus training for a while, a distinctive dent in her helmet, corresponding with her right temple, showed how close she came to serious damage.

“You should wear a helmet every time, you don’t know when you will fall,” Ms Sitte-Meagher said.

“I say to my kids, ‘You’ve only got one head — protect it’.”

Erica has now been reunited with her rescuers twice and is full of admiration for their quick reactions and for defying the bus driver’s initial reaction.

“I just have a lot of respect for the girls … it’s easy to say it’s not my problem and to keep going,” she said.

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