CLEVELAND -- An 11-year-old boy said that he got behind the wheel of a runaway school bus to save his brother and his classmates.

"I was about to jump off, but I didn’t. I decided not to because I didn't want to leave my brother," David Murphy said.

He told his story on "Good Morning America" on Wednesday.

David is being hailed as a hero for steering the bus full of children to safety.

Images: School Bus Hits Bridge

He was among 27 students headed to a charter school on Monday when the driver stopped at a service station, pumped about $40 of fuel and went into the rest room while the bus was parked and running.

While the driver was away, the bus began rolling about 300 feet down a side street that swoops through an industrial area and was on a collision course with a tractor-trailer.

"The bus started rolling. Then there was a truck in front of it. I decided to get in front of the wheel and turn in front of the truck," David said.

He said the other students were screaming, hollering and freaking out. They jumped off the front of the bus.

He said he had to get the bus off the road to protect his classmates. He ended up hitting a support pillar for the Inner Belt Bridge.

His mother said that she was amazed.

"I was shocked at the way the bus looked. When I saw the position of the bus it looked like the bus was parked," Patricia said.

He told his mother he didn't want to go down the hill.

"I couldn’t believe he had that direction. I asked him, 'What made you jump?' He said, 'I don't know mom -- God," she said.

He said that after he hit the pillar he dove into a bus seat. He said he didn't want to go through a window.

He said he thought he was going to get into trouble for driving the bus.

It's not clear why the bus started to roll. Investigators did not find any mechanical problems.

The driver, Michael Weir, 57, will be cited for leaving a vehicle unattended with the keys in the ignition and for registration violations, police said.

Weir has a valid commercial driver's license but wasn't registered with the state as required, police said. His license was suspended for six months in 2006 and was reissued July 16.

Aqua Limo, identified by the fire department as the company owning the bus, issued a statement Tuesday that it does not own the bus involved in the crash, that the school informed Aqua Limo on Friday that its services were no longer needed and that the school hired Weir.

But the head of the school said in a brief news conference outside of the school that Weir was Aqua Limo's employee. Alexis Rainbow said Weir was on his fourth day Monday driving a school route for Aqua Limo, and the school didn't tell Aqua Limo its services were no longer needed until Monday night, after the mishap.