This week’s horrifying Mexico-bound tour bus accident killing two and injuring dozens south of San Antonio is still more tragic evidence that buses, in many ways, are unsafe. And something should be done about it.

This bus, at least, was part of a legitimate bus line: Americanos USA, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dallas-based Greyhound Lines Inc. That was not the case when 17 persons traveling from Houston to a religious retreat died in a bus crash north of Dallas in 2008. That bus was not legally licensed to operate.

But even sanctioned tour buses or charter buses can have deadly bus accidents. And why are bus wrecks so dangerous, if not fatal? It starts with seat belts.

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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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Do you feel lucky? Well, do you?

If so, you might want to try your luck in multiple ways. One would be planning a trip to a casino resort in order to gamble. Another would be to take such a trip via a chartered casino tour bus.

Such buses are operated in order to ferry large groups of people across a significant distance to a casino, where they are expected to gamble. Often the passengers pay very little, since the casino figures it will make even more money via the passengers’ gambling losses.

This strategy proved tragically unlucky for a group of South Carolina people who recently visited Harrah’s Tunica casino in northwest Mississippi. For their trip back home on Sunday, 43 people rode a casino bus from the casino toward an airport. Along the way, the bus flipped over onto a median, killing three people and injuring several others. (more…)

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