Officials say 17 children have suffered minor injuries after one school bus rear-ended another in Dallas on the way to summer classes.
Tim Clark with the Richardson Independent School District says police are trying to determine what caused the low-speed crash Tuesday morning. Clark says the injured students, ranging in age from 11 to 16, complained of aches and pains.
Clark says the buses are operated by Dallas County. The vehicles were hauling students to Lake Highlands Junior High School and Lake Highlands High School.
Clark says each bus carried about 60 students and a driver. Uninjured children were transferred to other buses and continued on to summer school.
Dallas police did not immediately indicate whether anyone would be charged.
AP
West Nile Virus Shows Up in Two Dallas Neighborhoods
After making a tiny blip on the radar late last summer, West Nile is here much earlier this year. Dallas officials say they plan to spray for mosquitoes in two neighborhoods Thursday night.
They have the first two mosquito pools to test positive for the virus. In southeast Dallas the neighborhood bounded by Elam Road, Prairie Creek, C F Hawn, and Haymarket will be sprayed starting at 10pm. In southwest Dallas, spraying is scheduled for the area inside Mexicana Road, Ingersoll, Singleton and Pluto Street.
BJ Austin, KERA News
FW Trinity Vision Plan Could Pose Traffic Jam
A City Council update on the Fort Worth Trinity River Vision Project was more about roads and traffic than water and recreation. Three new bridges are part of the project: Henderson, North Main, and White Settlement Road.
Trinity River Vision officials say if Fort Worth gets a new transportation grant, all three bridges could be under construction at the same time. Councilman Sal Espino says that could be a real traffic headache. He says the city needs to plan how it will get information about detours to commuters.
“Henderson, as you know, Highway 199 is a major gateway into downtown. And it’s not just north Fort Worth residents, northwest Fort Worth folks, northwest Tarrant County and other folks that come in – commuters from other communities in this metroplex. So, it’s going to be critical that we get the word out to commuters,” said Espino.
Work on the Henderson Bridge starts in January. North Main bridge construction begins in late 2013, followed immediately by White Settlement if the grant comes through. The $900 million Trinity River plans include a bypass channel on the river for flood control and creation of an urban waterfront community just north of downtown; as well as revitalization of Gateway Park to the east.
BJ Austin, KERA News
Buffett's Berkshire buys small Texas newspaper
Berkshire Hathaway's newspaper division is acquiring a small Texas paper in the home of Texas A&M University.
Berkshire's Omaha World-Herald Co. said Tuesday it will acquire the Bryan-College Station Eagle from the privately held Evening Post Publishing Co., of Charleston, S.C.
Purchase terms for the 20,000-circulation newspaper with 95 employees were not disclosed.
But the deal fits with Berkshire CEO Warren Buffett's stated interest in buying small and medium-sized newspapers in places with a strong sense of community.
Last month, Berkshire announced a deal to buy 63 newspapers from Media General Inc. for $142 million.
And Berkshire disclosed owning about 3.2 percent of newspaper firm Lee Enterprises' stock at the end of March.
Jim Wilson will remain the Eagle's publisher, and the World-Herald says no major changes are planned there.
AP
Dozens of dolphins stranded in Texas since fall
More than 120 dolphins have stranded off the Texas coast, prompting a federal agency to declare the event "unusual" and investigate whether the deaths are related to others in the Gulf of Mexico.
All but four of the 123 dolphins that washed up on Texas shores from November through March were dead. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration listed it as an "unusual mortality" event because it met three of seven criteria.
NOAA says the strandings coincided with a drought-related algae bloom or "red tide" that can harm marine life.
NOAA says the bloom is suspect, but only one of several possibilities. Researchers also are investigating if it is related to more than 700 other strandings off the Gulf Coast and Florida or to the 2010 oil spill.
AP
Life term for man in Fort Worth double slaying
A North Texas man has been sentenced to life in prison without parole over a 2010 double slaying.
Investigators say the victims were in a vehicle that was stopped at a Fort Worth intersection when 20-year-old Rashad Glenn opened fire. Police earlier said the gunman was in another car, jumped out and begin shooting.
Glenn was convicted Monday of capital murder. Prosecutors did not seek the death penalty, so Glenn gets an automatic life prison term in the deaths of 21-year-old Charles Govan and 20-year-old Richard Hawkins.
The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports a courtroom observer has been sentenced to six months in jail for trying to leap a barrier last week and reach Glenn.
AP