ATLANTA — It's been 24 hours after one of the scariest moments of her life; a Dekalb County woman is recounting the moments she feared for her life on Tuesday when a hijacked Gwinnett County transit bus came barreling toward her.
"I just saw police, and then I noticed this, like smoking Gwinnett County Transit bus," Gloria White said. "It's going way too fast. It's getting closer and closer, and I'm just like, 'It's going to hit me. It's not going to stop!'"
The bus was on an uncontrollable path, leading police on a multicounty chase and hitting dozens of cars. 11Alive Sky Tracker followed its route against traffic closely and captured her car getting hit.
"I was like, 'Okay, I'm probably gonna die' because this bus is just barreling at me, and it has no intentions of stopping," White said. "It was just such a big crunch and crash, and just like the glass, like just coming at you and breaking is just really jarring."
She had just left the bank before she got trapped in its path. Her passenger side got hit head-on. The bus kept going, and White was left with a totaled car and hurt.
"Bruises and cuts and stuff from it. I'm just thankful that this is, like, my only big injury. I have a broken wrist, and I'm very sore today," White said.
Despite all of this, her concern was the bus driver, who police said was being held at gunpoint, and the people on board were also being held hostage.
"He was just standing, gun pointed, and, like, you could see the fear," White said. "I'm specifically thankful for that driver because, you know, they had a gun to their head. I saw that person. I looked them in the eye. It was me and the driver just looking at each other, and they had like a neon vest on, and just like you, they didn't want to be driving and crashing into people, and they were forced to."
White has four weeks of recovery for her broken wrist but says that's minor in comparison to the mental toll the impact of the crash will have.
The man who forcibly hijacked the Gwinnett County transit bus on Tuesday, leading officers on a wild chase where a passenger was found dead, was identified and charged according to jail records on Wednesday.
Fulton County Jail records show that 39-year-old Joseph Grier was charged with the following:
- Murder
- Kidnapping (14 counts)
- Hijacking a motor vehicle (1st Degree)
- Aggravated assault (14 counts)
- Possession of a firearm or knife during the commission of or attempt to commit certain felonies
- Possession of a firearm by a convicted felon