“HEY BOSS WE ARE ON FIRE!”

It was the middle of the winter of 2005. We, Josh McDowell and the crew, were traveling from Fargo North Dakota to Rapid City South Dakota. We were to make the short 575 mile trip overnight in our Prevost tour bus. We had been on tour for nearly two weeks and Rapid City was the last stop before we all flew home for a much needed break.

At the time I was managing the ragtag crew of Dads, interns and Campus Crusade Staffers. In previous few days we had lost our main generator to the bus for one reason or another, so we were already limping along on a back-up generator.

After leaving Fargo we were on the road about 15 minutes when all the sudden the power went off in the bus. We lost the back-up generator. We had few options at this point. So in a last ditch effort we stopped at an Arby’s to try and brainstorm what we could do next. (Because we all know how well we think after eating 5 beef n’ cheddar’s for $5).

Our conclusion, buy a propane powered gas heater from a local sporting goods store and run it inside the bus, dress warm and push to Rapid City and have the bus worked on there.

It was an interesting ride for the next hour, the bus was quiet. The guys were trying to read by flashlight, stay warm buy hovering close to the front heaters coming off the engine and Josh was in the back of the bus with his space heater trying not to suffocate from the fumes.

As we drove the temperature outside dipped below -20. It truly was the dead of winter. All of sudden as I was dozing off in my bunk, I heard our bus driver yell “Hey Boss! We are on fire!” I jumped to my feet threw on my sandals (at this point the space heater had done such a great job of warming the bus that we were all in t-shirts and shorts and completely comfortable).

I ran to the front of the bus. Dave Albertson, our bus driver at the time explained to me that the rear axle on the driver side was shooting flames out the side of the bus, very near to the gas tank. I grabbed a fire extinguisher and told Dave to stop the bus.

In -20 degrees wearing only shorts, t-shirt and sandals I ran outside the bus on the side of Interstate 29 and put out the fire on the wheel well of the bus. It was later determined that the axle grease had become overheated and caused the axle to catch fire, costing almost 20 grand to replace!

Putting out that fire wasn’t the most heroic thing I have done, but it was one of the craziest things that I had seen on the road. I will never forget standing there with the fire extinguisher barely able to breathe because my lungs felt like they were going to collapse from the cold winds of the passing cars.

The worst part of the whole ordeal is that I next had to hitch hike to the airport (nearly midnight & -25 outside at this point), rent a car, drive back to pick the guys up and drive all night to Rapid City to make our event on time. Once the event was over I had to drive our guys to the airport and then drive back to Sioux Falls to deal with our busted bus. I had left our intern and driver behind and they slowly limped the bus to a hotel and waited for me to get back.

It was a crazy 18 hours, but it was one of the most unforgettable days of my life.

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