A Queens bus driver escaped an early morning box cutter attack with just a few stitches and a scare. NY1's Jose Martinez sat down with the driver to hear his story and filed the following report..

Bus driver George Seger is stitched up and secure after a harrowing start to his Thursday morning shift, when he became a victim of random street violence.

"It was so out of the blue," Seger said. "I'm not expecting anyone at 3:45 in the morning to have a box cutter."

Police say 48-year-old Carlos Lema slashed Seger at Queens Boulevard and 69th Street after the veteran bus driver grabbed a morning coffee just before starting his 4 a.m. shift along the Q18 route, which runs between Maspeth and Astoria.

"I didn't feel anything because it turned out to be a box cutter. It was a very thin razor," Seger said. "But he cut my shirt, my undershirt and my skin, and I started bleeding."

Lema then made it easy for police to arrest him by not leaving the scene after telling Seger to call police. 

"He stepped back a little bit and he raised his box cutter. They told him to drop it, and they swarmed him and they brought him to the ground," Seger said.

Lema was charged with assault, menacing and possession of a weapon.  

Seger was treated at Elmhurst Hospital, where he received 11 stitches.

"Soon as I saw my shirt turning red, it was apparent I had been cut. Then I looked down at his hand and I saw the box cutter," he said.

Seger says he has no clue why the man came after him.

It's not the first time Seger has been attacked while on the job, though the other assaults have taken place inside the bus.

"I had a hatchet many, many, many years ago pulled on me," he said. "I had a knife pulled on me about 15 years ago."

John Samuelsen, the president of Transport Workers Union Local 100, said the latest assault highlights the hazards faced by bus drivers.

"They are out there in uniform, targets for the criminals and the crazies, as they move millions of riders every day," Samuelsen said. "Thank God Operator Seger wasn’t killed. He certainly could have been."

Instead, he plans to be back behind the wheel as soon as he can.