HOLLY SPRINGS, N.C. — Some North Carolina middle schoolers have created a new device they hope will end a dangerous trend of drivers ignoring stopped school buses.
The students designed a bus stop sign.
[ [ALSO READ: Kannapolis cracks down on drivers passing stopped school buses] ]
Whenever a bus gets within 300 feet of a stop, the sign uses solar panels, cell phones and GPS to activate flashing lights.
"A dynamic bus stop sign that uses wireless transmission to communicate so that people like motorists, bus drivers, and people that stop know that the bus is coming," student Evan Kruger said.
The nine inventors won a statewide content run by Samsung.
They are now in a national competition with a $100,000 prize.
Channel 9 has reported on several occasions where drivers did not stop for school buses.
In December, a viewer sent Channel 9 footage of a tractor-trailer speeding past a bus outside the Charlotte Motor Speedway. When we went to the bus stop ourselves, we saw several other cars ignored the stopped bus.
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