Houston-to-Monterrey bus crash kills one

At least 20 ‘minor’ injuries in morning wreck after vehicle leaves roadway and rolls over

One passenger was killed and at least 20 others were injured when a commercial bus traveling from Houston to Monterrey crashed in northern Mexico early Tuesday.

The bus, from the Mexican company Pegasso, left the roadway and rolled over while passing through the village of Los Ramones on the Reynosa-Monterrey highway.

Authorities said as many as 20 people suffered minor injuries, and reports from the scene by Mexican media outlets showed the bus lying on its side in one lane of a divided highway, with most of the vehicle in a ditch that straddled the median.

“We don’t know the cause of the accident,” said Raul Cervantes, a Pegasso spokesperson. “It’s very unfortunate that a person has died.”

Cervantes identified the dead man as Claudio Cazares, a passenger. The death and identity of the victim could not be independently confirmed.

The spokesman said the bus was carrying 39 passengers, 10 of whom, including the bus driver, were treated at a local hospital.

“All of them are fine, only with minor injuries,” Cervantes said, while others had only “scratches” that did not required hospitalization.

Cervantes said the company is insured and will take care of the passengers’ medical needs.

The bus departed from Houston around 8 p.m. Monday and was scheduled to arrive in the northern Mexico city this morning.

The Mexican bus company does business as Pegasso Travel and Tours, 6614 Harrisburg. It operates 26 buses and employes 12 drivers.

The company has a satisfactory U.S. bus safety rating, according to a federal transportation database.

It has an out-of-service rate of 47 percent due largely to maintenance issues, more than double the average rate of U.S. carriers, according to bus inspection records of the U.S. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

Federal inspections over the last two years found that 11 of 40 Pegasso drivers had violated either the 10 hour-per-day driving rule or failed to record their driving hours correctly.

In all, federal inspectors found 66 violations during the last two years ranging from bus driver issues to faulty brake systems, broken turn signals, safety lighting and a lack of charged fire extinguishers.

Tuesday’s crash in Mexico was the company’s second in the last two years, following a minor accident involving a 15passenger van in McCulloch County in Central Texas in February 2017. That accident did not result in any deaths or injuries.

“In 25 years in business, the company hasn’t had any accident of this magnitude (with fatalities), and we are sorry,” Cervantes said.