WYANDOTTE, Okla. -- The fire started in Wyandotte's bus barn's storage area late Wednesday night.
By Thursday morning ten buses were gone, and classes were canceled for the week. Now, superintendent Troy Gray is looking for solutions.
"We transport about 450 kids a day into our district. And it's a huge school district, 160 square miles. We're their only ride. It's wintertime and for some of them we're they're warmth and their food too," Gray said.
Close to 80 percent of students in the district qualify for bus service. The middle school principal said she notices a large drop in attendance when transportation is suspended.
"Some of them it's just the fact that they have one working vehicle... and dad may work nights and can't get home in time before or vice versa. Some of them just don't have a vehicle at all," Stacy Sloan said.
The superintendent isn't sure how to pay for a new bus fleet. He said the district's revenue has dropped by $600,000 over the last ten years.
"This is a game changer for us. It has the potential to really, really put you in harms way. Because generally you buy transportation and things like that from your savings. And those savings have slowly been chipped away, dwindled away," Gray said.
The schools are already seeing help from other districts. Seneca, Carl Junction, and Miami Public Schools have loaned buses. Caney School District in Kansas drove down a donated bus this afternoon.
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