BATON ROUGE, LA (WAFB) -
Some Greyhound passengers claim the bus company canceled their trip, dropped them off in an unfamiliar city, and left them to fend for themselves.
Tina Belvin and Burnell Walker had been trying to get to McComb, Mississippi since Monday. They hopped on a Greyhound bus in Houston, Texas but said the winter weather brought their journey to an unexpected stop in Baton Rouge. They said their trip got delayed for 10 hours before being canceled. Then, they said, their situation got worse.
"They closed the terminal and put us out," Belvin said.
"They told us we had to get out," Walker said.
Belvin and Walker said they and two other passengers were stranded.
"I was trying to figure out where we were going to go. I had no money and couldn't go to a shelter because people said they were full," Walker said.
Belvin said she slept outside of a nearby business. But when it got too cold, she said, she got desperate.
"I panhandled. I've been panhandling over here by this Exxon station. It's been a rough journey," Belvin said.
Walker arrived with the clothes on his back, two bags, and just enough money to get a hotel room.
Both passengers said a Greyhound representative at the Florida Boulevard bus station told them the company is not responsible for accommodating its passengers when trips are canceled due to weather.
"Now I know what it feels to be homeless. I know now, first hand. Nowhere to go and no accommodations from Greyhound," Belvin said.
A man who said he works for Greyhound told 9News to leave and contact the company's corporate office.
Belvin and Walker continued on to McComb on the 10:55 a.m. bus, but they said Greyhound has not heard the last from them.
"I'm going to take it a step further. The Better Business Bureau, somebody has got to do something," Belvin said.
Greyhound corporate released a statement disputing Belvin and Walker's versions of the incident. It said, in part, "If we were informed that they had no where to go, we would have provided them with hotel accommodations as we did for the other two customers whose schedules were canceled."
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