In a deranged prank, a man wearing a surgical mask, got onto a bus with a woman in Los Angeles on Monday. The proclaimed, "I have Ebola!" then took the mask off, tossed it to the ground and got off the bus.
The Washington Post reported that the FBI is involved in trying to track down the man, with an investigation being treated as a possible terrorist or criminal threat, according to Los Angeles Metro officials.
"Assuming this is a hoax, if people think it's funny to do something like this, they're not going to think it's funny when they are arrested and prosecuted," Metro spokesman Marc Littman told the Post. "It's very disruptive to people's lives and costs taxpayers thousands of dollars."
The driver immediately called central dispatch and offloaded passengers before he drove the vehicle to the bus yard, Littman told the Post. The bus has been taken out of service, and the driver -- a 25-year veteran of Metro -- asked to be taken to the hospital to be checked out, where he has shown no signs of the illness. As a precaution, he won't be back at work for three more weeks.
There have been zero cases of Ebola in the state of California.
According to the Post, this isn't the first time an incident like this has happened. Less than a week ago, somebody reportedly yelled, "I have Ebola. You all are screwed" and yelled, "I've been to Africa" as the plane was about to land in the Dominican Republic from Philadelphia.
