When 34-year-old Donovan Sid posted iPhone footage of an open double-decker tour bus getting soaked from two fire hydrants, he had no idea that it would blow up on the internet, he tells ANIMAL. “My friend hit me, like, your video went viral, and I said, really??!!” Born and raised in New York City, he posts videos to Instagram and Facebook all the time. Sid is not sure why the 15-second clip got picked up by major news outlets. “Maybe because it’s summer time and a lot of people can relate? It took me back to when I was a kid, playing in the hydrant.”
The Gray Line sightseeing bus was headed up Saint Nicholas Avenue around 127th Street in Harlem on July 8th, a hot and humid Wednesday at about 3pm, when the top deck got doused with water from both sides of the street. Sid says that the kids manipulating the two hydrants were about 11-12 years old and weren’t just going after tourists.
“I saw the bus coming and I knew they weren’t gonna let them slide,” he tells us. “They were wetting everybody! That was like a jackpot to them.” No one called the cops, Sid adds. “Some of the tourists were laughing. I saw smiles on their faces.”
Though he doesn’t really care for tourists, Sid says, “It is what it is, you know? Nothing against it, but they definitely turned down the wrong block if they did not want to get wet.” As the bus continued on its scheduled route through Harlem, with about 10 to 15 wet tourists in tow, the kids continued soaking other vehicles.
Meanwhile, Sid is still being bombarded with Facebook friend requests from strangers.
