MCTS driver rescues a missing boy

Sometimes, you just have to smile at the generous nature of strangers. When Mike Karges, an 11-year veteran operator with the Milwaukee County Transit System (MCTS) started his shift Thursday night, he probably thought it would be like any other. But it wasn’t; he saved a little boy from the freezing cold.

Like all MCTS operators, Karges received a data message at 9:48 p.m. from the MCTS Dispatch Office, at the request of local law enforcement, describing a missing 9-year-old boy. When he left his layover and turned on to National Ave. from Highway 100, at about 11:41 p.m., he noticed a little guy dressed in a school uniform, tie and sports jacket walking along the road.

The poor, little soul matched the dispatcher’s description. Karges pulled his bus to the side of the road, managed to communicate with the boy (who spoke little English) and got him to get in the bus until Dispatch could provide assistance. Karges also gave the cold child his big winter coat to shake the evening’s chill.

“He must’ve been freezing, all he had on was a sport coat,” Karges has said. “I bundled him up in my big winter jacket, and gave him a candy cane I’d gotten from my supervisor at the station earlier.”

Karges then spotted a West Allis police office and flagged him down. And, the officer called the Milwaukee Police Department so the boy could be reunited with his family.

The bus driver finished his route that evening, but probably with a bigger smile than usual. “I’m happy it turned out this way, it could’ve been a lot worse,” he said. “I’m glad we can help. I have two children of my own, and I know what his parents must’ve been going through.”