When you pay $10,000 or more for a recreational vehicle, you’d expect it to be safe to drive. Sadly, that’s often not the case with an ATV, or all terrain vehicle.

Again, an ATV accident has claimed a life, this time in the Houston area. Howard Lewis Bear, 33, of Crosby died Friday night in a Channelview ATV accident.

Harris County sheriff’s deputies said Bear’s son and daughter were in the vehicle with him, and none were wearing safety helmets when the crash occurred, ejecting all three from the ATV. The children were not seriously injured.

The cause of the crash? All we know is that Bear lost control of the ATV. At that point, the absence of safety helmets became a factor. Also, ATVs are essentially one-person vehicles which should not carry passengers. But the bottom line is that this accident happened because the driver lost control of his vehicle, and that driver, Bear, is now dead.

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Finally, progress is being made in the face of mounting carnage on America’s roads due to driver distractions caused by cell phones. And it’s not what you might expect.

No, it’s not a new state law, such as those in New York and California, which bans using cell phones while driving without a headset that frees both hands. Rather, this progress comes in the form of a device which will disable cell phones for real-time talking, texting or receiving messages while that phone is moving at a speed associated with a vehicle.

A Canadian software company called Aegis Mobility has developed the device, which is called a DriveAssistT. In effect, it takes the decision to use a cell phone while driving out of the driver’s hands.

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Last month, a Michigan woman was sentenced to 15 years in prison when four of her bulldogs got loose from her property and, without provocation, attacked and killed two people. This week, such justice was applied for the first time in Texas.

A couple who live near Breckenridge in North Central Texas has been convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison after their pit bull dogs killed a 7-year-old neighbor.

This is Texas’ first conviction under a new law which holds dog owners responsible when their animals are unsecured and wind up injuring or killing someone in an unprovoked attack off their property. Such a tragedy would not occur if dog owners were not negligent of their duty to protect others.

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How dangerous are Yamaha Rhino ATVs and other ATVs? How dangerous do you want them to be?

Indeed, danger and risk seem to be selling points for these highly accident-prone vehicles, whose wildly erratic and thrill-driven operation winds up killing and maiming thousands of Americans each year. In large part that’s because Yamaha Rhino and other ATVs fail to live up to their fun-loving promise, and instead wreak havoc due to manufacturing design errors which make them inherently unsafe.

Even so, mastering such risks is part of the hype that drives  Yamaha Rhino and other ATV sales, if you check out ads and promotional clips used to sell them. These show the strange vehicles – which look like reckless little brothers of Apollo’s Lunar Rovers – bouncing and churning down bumpy roads, across creeks and up steep, muddy hills. The more difficult and dangerous the terrain, the better, seems to be the message. Yet the promise made to buyers is exhilaration – not extinction.

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While buses in general can be as risky as trying to draw on an inside straight, casino tour buses can be an even worse bet.

In California Sunday, a casino tour bus taking passengers from Sacramento to a gambling den flipped over and rolled into a ditch, killing eight people and critically injuring at least 30 others. As this and other bus accidents have shown, buses can be extremely dangerous when they turn over, which they often do.

The California Highway Patrol said the bus driver was perhaps on medication, and CHP has charged that driver with driving under the influence. The bus also lacked a valid license plate, having expired Texas plates. Built in the 1980s, the bus also lacked seatbelts, but that’s a common failing on buses.

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A problem with waking up Americans about the carnage on their roads and highways is that traffic tragedies, though they take an enormous toll, are incremental. Six die in Florida. Two more die in East Texas. It’s news, and it’s shattering to the victims’ immediate families, but in the broader news context of a given day, it tends to slip in beneath the radar.

Of course, at the end of the year will come the news that another 40,000 or more Americans have died in traffic accidents. But that cumulative amount spread out over 365 days won’t have the same impact as if those people had died simultaneously, or from one cause.

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What will it take to get the message through to Americans that we are slaughtering each other on our roads, highways and train lines, and all for the sake of a phone call or a text message that could have waited?

Perhaps a catastrophic train wreck will be our wake-up call? Or perhaps school bus carnage? Actually, both such things already have occurred this month.

These horrific accidents could have been avoided if the driver of a semi truck and a commuter train had been paying attention, rather than being distracted by using a cell phone.

In Florida, four young students are in critical condition and a 13-year-old eighth-grade girl is dead because a man driving a large semi truck was talking on his cell phone and slammed into the back of a school bus as it was stopped to let students get off.

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And so, it continues. More than 10 days after Hurricane Ike’s onslaught, hundreds of thousands in southeast Texas still lack electrical power. Debris is piled high, trees are downed and buildings are damaged. With traffic lights out, congestion rules, and hotter weather is sparking hot tempers. Hurricane fatigue has set in.

Yet the Houston area will survive. Why? Because its boomtown spirit knows no other way. Progress may be slow, but it’s happening, and the region eventually will get back to normal — which is to say, bustling, thriving and alive.

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From homeowners to businesses, those who suffered from Hurricane Ike have a lot of cleanup to do — and a lot of insurance claims to file. But sadly, insurance coverage isn’t always promptly or adequately paid. If you have trouble with hurricane insurance fraud, you may need a Houston hurricane insurance fraud lawyer with Jim S. Adler & Associates.

Many businesses have business interruption insurance, which covers their losses when they are forced to shut down temporarily due to circumstances such as a fire or hurricane. Their business interruption insurance normally should provide coverage for lost net profits, as well as for continuing expenses related to the interruption.

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For anyone who thinks they aren’t responsible for their pet dog’s behavior, think again. A woman in Michigan has been sentenced to spend up to 15 years in prison because her bulldogs mauled and killed two people.

The woman had a horse farm on her property, about 45 miles west of Detroit, but the fence surrounding it was inadequate to keep her 10 dogs from leaving the property. Four of the dogs attacked and killed a 91-year-old man who was standing in his driveway and also killed a 56-year-old woman who was jogging nearby.

The woman also must pay restitution, and she will serve at least 43 months in prison. Her 10 dogs have been euthanized by authorities.

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