The Skycopter View of Atlanta’s Latest Traffic Madness

The bus stormed rush hour traffic on I-75/85/northbound from the heart of downtown Atlanta and on I-85/northbound to DeKalb and Gwinnett . It was here that we intercepted this surreal incident in the Skycopter WSB.

Skycopter pilot Alex Sprecher, photographer Bart Spradling and I diverted from our original destination on I-285 (a car fire had cut off I-285/northbound on Covington Highway – another day of (slow information, huh?) and took I-85/northbound to Jimmy Carter Boulevard (exit 99).

As we approached a tree bank east of the highway, we saw an armada of police cars closing northbound I-85. They were preparing to barricade and block this massive and heavy missile.

Then we saw a bus right behind it, with a chorus of officers in tow. We flew towards him, then followed him onto I-85/north and to the Jimmy Carter exit – the chaos intensified.

The bus jumped onto the exit ramp and collided with patrol cars attempting to obstruct it, before turning right and heading southeast on Jimmy Carter Blvd. Passing motorists generally avoided injury, and we warned them on 95.5 WSB of the impending crisis hurtling toward them. A phalanx of Georgia State Patrol cars, aided by cruisers from several agencies, remained in pursuit of that bus.

The pursuit continued on Jimmy Carter Blvd. and where it changes name to Mountain Industrial Blvd., crossing Lawrenceville Highway. DeKalb roads then suffered their second dose of the same diversion.

I thought the hijacker would order the driver to take the bus on Highway 78 because its speed on the back roads had decreased. But the driver, under threat of being the second shooting victim on his own bus, turned left into the opposing lanes of traffic onto Hugh Howell Road.

They then immediately crossed the center line at Hugh Howell and continued correctly in the eastbound lanes, narrowly avoiding major collisions with undoubtedly terrified passersby.

We must credit the calm and goodwill of bus driver Ernst Antoine. A Haitian pastor, Antoine told Channel 2 Action News that his duty to protect his passengers and those outside the bus drove his decision.

“Because I have to do the right thing, no matter what happens to me,” Antoine said. Antoine’s daughter said her father had only traveled this route for three months, but had been driving buses for 20 years.

Officers attempted several times to pull alongside the bus and slow it down, and were eventually able to restrain it and inflict enough damage to stop it. Officers entered the injured bus on Hugh Howell Road near Rosser Road, a heavily laden stretch of trees and shadows in the Smoke Rise neighborhood east of downtown Tucker.

From our vantage point, more than 1,000 feet above the fray, there appeared to be no elongated standoff. Police entered the bus and eventually removed the suspect, Grier. EMS responders tended to passenger Ernest Byrd Jr., 58, who was shot in the leg by a gunshot from his own weapon, allegedly by Grier. Byrd Jr. later died.

I called the unfolding of this surreal and dramatic WSB Skycopter chase without knowing that there was a driver at gunpoint or a suspected hijacker who had just seen three people shot in the center- city ​​of Atlanta, then this suspect shot and killed by police. Grier admitted to reporters that he was bipolar and no longer took medication. He also told the gallery he wished he had a gun and could have stopped the Peachtree Center attacker.

Instead, Grier allegedly shot Byrd Jr. for intervening in his own outburst and spreading terror and grief. Antoine, for his part, did not let himself be consumed by the moment and decided to act with others in mind.

The shootings and bus hijacking of June 12, 2024, will be unforgettable for many Atlantans, especially those stuck on the bus or at Peachtree Center — or in stopped traffic with a crazed shooter ordering that bus to keep going… toward them.

Being airborne over a bus hijacking will take place at my “Mount Rush Hour” right next to the March 2017 I-85 Bridge Fire, the January 2014 Snowpocalypse, the I-285 plane in May 2015 and floods in September 2009.

But no one should forget what motivated the threatened Gwinnett Transit driver that fateful afternoon. Antoine’s duty to others saved lives. And wouldn’t our roads – and planet Earth, for that matter – be much safer if every driver applied this filter?

Doug Turnbull, the PM Drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. Download the Triple Team Traffic Alerts app to automatically hear reports from the WSB Traffic Team when driving near hot spots. Contact him at [email protected]