FOR those old enough to remember it, the tragic bus crash at Greta has brought to mind another horror bus crash which remains the most deadly crash in Australia's history
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On December 22, 1989, 35 people were killed when two full tourist coaches were involved in a head-on collision on the Pacific Highway, just north of Kempsey.
Both buses were travelling at 100kmh, and the impact forced the south-bound bus embedded in the first five rows of the north-bound bus.
As well as the 35 fatalities, which included both drivers, another 41 people were injured.
Just a month before the Kempsey crash, on October 20, 1989, a semi-trailer veered into oncoming traffic and hist a passenger bus near Grafton, killing 21 people and injuring 22 other people.
It was after those two deadly incidents that the coroner who presided over inquiries into both recommended that the highway be upgraded to a four-lane dual carriageway between Hexham and Queensland.
THE NATION'S DEADLIEST BUS ACCIDENTS
* 1973: Eighteen dead, 21 injured after a tour bus carrying Adelaide pensioners plunged into the Tumut Ponds Dam in the Snowy Mountains
* 1979: Four dead, including two high school students, when a bus rolled off a cliff 60km south of Brisbane
* 1987: Eight students died when a bus returning from high school camp veered off a road near Gordonvale in Queensland
* 1989: Twenty-one killed in a collision between a coach and a semitrailer on the Pacific Highway near Grafton on the NSW north coast
* 1989: Two months later, 35 were dead and 39 injured at Clybucca, near Kempsey on the NSW mid-north coast, after two coaches collided in Australia's worst road disaster
* 1990: Eleven dead, 47 injured when a bus crashed off a scenic mountain drive near Mount Tamborine in the Gold Coast hinterland
* 1990: Eight dead and four injured when a small bus and a road train collided near Katherine in the Northern Territory
* 1993: Ten killed and more than 30 injured when a bus and semi-trailer collided on the Hume Highway
* 1994: Twelve dead, 40 injured when a tour bus carrying mostly elderly passengers veered off the Gateway Arterial road in Boondall, northern Brisbane
* 2002: Four killed when a minibus crashed into a tree on the Riverina Highway near the NSW-Victoria border
* 2023: Ten killed and 25 injured after a charter bus carrying wedding guests crashed in the NSW Hunter Valley
