Tromsoe Bus Driver

Hi! My name is Tore, and for the time being I work as a bus driver in Tromsoe, Norway, to finance my studies.

This story took place a year ago, as I had been driving almost every weekend for a year. In Tromsbuss, the company, part time drivers like myself are constantly switched from one route to another to fill in for the regulars one.

This winter night I got the route 20, last departure. The thing with this is that if there are no passengers, we would finish in Kroken, otherwise we have to continue to a very remote location called Steines, a trip that takes 45 min more.

Unfortunately at this time, a boy in the sixteens lived in this little fish-village Steines, and had a girlfriend in Kroken, so I was told I would have to take the full trip.

As I arrived in Kroken, half past twelve in the night, the bus was empty, but the boy was waiting at the stop. He paid and went to the back of the bus where he fell asleep. In northern Norway we have the polarnight in the winter (the sun does not rise above the horizon at all for 2 months) so the night was crystal clear.

I tuned up my radio and eventually got to Steines. Here the boy went home, and I went out to stretch my legs. I turned out all the lights and opened all doors to let fresh air in, and turned off the engine.

In the snow I could hear the boy walk away, and then it was all quiet. As I got cold from staring at the stars, I went back into my bus, and returned back to my drivers seat. I shut the door and started the engine without any lights on. This way you can see the road better.

To my surprise I suddenly noticed that a person had gotten into the bus and was sitting next to me. I only saw the man in my side-vision, because I had to concentrate on the road. As I began to explain to him that he couldn't take this bus back to Tromsoe, because I was off-duty, I turned to face him. But there was no-one there.

I more or less froze and probably panicked for a while. The next thing I remember is that I didn't want to sit in the dark with this thing. So I switched on all the lights in the bus, and now I clearly could see that all the twelve meters behind me with seats were empty. I laughed at myself, because I probably was tired, but my laughter silenced as I clearly could see a dark coated figure in the mirror above me sitting a bit further behind me this time.

My first thought was that someone was playing me for a fool, but as I looked straight into the mirror instead of my side-vision there was no-one there. To help myself from this situation, I turned the rear mirror in my bus away, and turned up the volume of my radio. But it was even worse to feel that someone was staring at me, and not be able see him. To my disappear the radio started to loose channels, and in the end there was only a sparkling clicking noise coming from it. I kept going faster. On this road there are no houses, the ocean is three meters to the right and only mountains to the left. As the alarm went on in the bus I was ready to die, but it was caused by one of the rear hatches opening itself, and before I could go on, I had to close it. I quickly opened the front door and went into the snow without looking at the passenger seat rows at all, because I feared the sight. I got behind the bus and closed the hatch, and as I rounded the corner of the bus again - to my surprise the radio was playing lovely tunes into the winter night, as if it had been working all the time. I felt my heart calm down and the spooky feeling was all gone.

I got into the bus again and continued home.

For a long time I kept my mouth closed about the incident, until one of the regular drivers told another one in the coffee break that he had felt a presence again!

A man that went crazy after he had served in the Armed force of Norway in Lebanon lived where I had stopped. He had killed three men by serving them methanol instead of alcohol (witch contains ethanol) and because of the remote location where he lived, they weren't able to seek help in time.

Until this day I am certain that one of them did try to get back to the city, although he had passed away 30 years ago... And I do not drive the route 20 at night time ever!

Tore S. Christensen, Tromsoe