By John C. Drake, Boston Globe

The 111 bus bound for Haymarket Station was empty except for its driver, a 48-year-old woman who has been with the MBTA for 13 months, when it stopped yesterday afternoon on Garfield Avenue near Exeter Street, police said.

A man in a hooded sweatshirt boarded the bus on the busy residential street, looked to the back of the bus to see that no one else was on board, and pulled out a small handgun.

He pointed it at the driver, demanding that she hand over her wallet and cash.

She immediately handed over her wallet, said Stephan G. MacDougall, president of the Boston Carmen's Union, who spoke with the driver last night.

Just as the driver dropped to the floor, police said, the man fired at least two shots in her direction. One struck the seat she had just occupied, and the other hit the fare box.

The gunman then fled.

"She was lucky," said Chelsea Police Captain Brian Kyes. "She's OK. Shaken up, obviously, but she was not struck."

MacDougall said the driver suffered minor shoulder injuries trying to evade the gunman.

The robbery points to the need to increase security for bus drivers, MacDougall said.

"I don't think the public recognizes the dangers my members face every day," MacDougall said.

"Nobody's blaming the authority for this attack, for some crazed maniac pulling a gun on a bus driver," he said. "But the union has always encouraged the MBTA to offer greater protection to the bus driver."

He mentioned video monitoring of buses, heavy police presence on bus routes, and Plexiglass enclosures for drivers as examples of security measures in place in other transit systems.

MacDougall said union officials plan to meet with MBTA management this week to discuss safety for MBTA employees.

MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo said it was the first time in at least 10 years that an MBTA driver had been robbed or fired upon.

But MacDougall said last night that any time an such an event takes place on a bus, it is an attack on the driver.

"This stuff happens to our members more often than anyone at the authority wants to admit," MacDougall said.

"Our members get assaulted verbally, physically, have weapons brandished, people refuse to pay fares - and they're out there on their own."

Pesaturo did not immediately return a call last night to respond to MacDougall's comments.

Chelsea and Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority police were looking for a white man between 20 and 30 years old with "heavy acne" on his face. He was wearing a black hooded sweatshirt when he boarded the bus, authorities said.

Pesaturo said the driver, who was not identified, was taken to a hospital as a precaution.

"Obviously, this was an extraordinarily traumatic experience for her," Pesaturo said.

After the shooting, schoolchildren and workers stepped off of buses on the heavily traveled street of single- and two-family houses as the bus was towed from the scene about 5:15 p.m. last night.

The bus was taken to the MBTA's Charlestown garage, where police continued to examine it for evidence, Pesaturo said.

The shooting rattled area residents.

"Too close," said Brenda Antonellis, sitting on her stoop on Garfield Avenue, a few doors from the bus stop. "It's a very quiet neighborhood."

"Chelsea is coming up in the world, and then something like this happens," said Fred Abbot, standing outside his daughter's home, directly in front of the bus stop.

John R. Ellement of the Globe staff contributed to this report. 

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