Bus Crash Kills 10 After Wedding Reception

A tragic bus crash in Australia killed ten members of a wedding party following a reception. The fatal incident this week occurred when the chartered bus overturned and bore similarities to an American crash five years ago.

The bus was carrying 53 people to their hotels after the wedding reception. The bus crashed at a roundabout around 11:30 p.m.

The driver was arrested following the crash, though the exact charges have not yet been announced.

Police said that they were investigating the exact cause of the crash, including fog and whether speed played a role.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that for “a joyous day like that, in a beautiful place, to end with such terrible loss of life and injury is so cruel and so sad and so unfair.”

He said that the bus was hired specifically for keeping its passengers safe.

“And that just adds to the unimaginable nature of this tragedy,” he said.

The disaster bears similarities to a wedding party limousine crash in upstate New York that killed 20 people in 2018. An investigation from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) cited an “egregious disregard for safety” by Prestige Limousine, which operated the vehicle.

In particular. the company was criticized for keeping the vehicle in poor shape, especially its brake system. The poor condition of the vehicle resulted in it careening down a hillside at more than 100 miles per hour and striking two pedestrians.

The New York Department of Transportation and Department of Motor Vehicles said in a joint statement that the inquiry’s findings showed “the shocking extremes to which the owners of Prestige went to break the law and falsify state and federal compliance records.”

The agencies also said that they each “ordered that vehicle off the road multiple times.”

The crash resulted in a number of new regulations in the state, including taking limos in poor conditions off the road and that all stretch limousines be required to have seat belts.

The manager at the company, Nauman Hussain, was recently convicted of manslaughter and faces a penalty of between five and 15 years in prison.