Startling Video: N.C. Bus Carrying 6 Kids Bursts Into Flames

The song about this bus isn't about the wheels on it going "round and round." Instead, it would be something about the flames engulfing it going "higher and higher."

A school bus carrying six children in Charlotte, N.C. on Wednesday caught fire, sending smoke and flames shooting from the windows. The driver was able to escort the kids out the back door, and is being called a hero. Video of the incident is breathtaking:

The Charlotte Observer reports the fire started because of a faulty motor of a fan heater. The paper has more on the driver:

Richardson, the bus driver, said she sensed trouble when she smelled something weird coming from her bus as she neared the end of her route.

It was different from the diesel fumes and exhaust that typically emanate from the heavy vehicles. It smelled, Richardson recalled, like burning wires.

Richardson, who was taking six children home from Chantilly Montessori School around 5 p.m., stopped the bus on Bearmore Drive, between Sardis Road and Monroe Road.

Then smoke began pouring into the bus from the front console.

She corralled the children to the back of the bus, then escaped with them through the back door, lowering some of the smaller children to the ground.

They watched as flames engulfed the bus and smoke poured out of the windows.

Unfortunately, bus fires in the area have become a common occurrence, especially for those with Thomas Built bus bodies. The Observer reports that WNCT-TV found that there were five such fires between 2010 and 2011 and four of those involved Thomas buses.