Despite Tuesday’s fatal school bus crash in Minnesota, safety experts say the big yellow buses are still the safest way for kids to get to and from school.

A Lieutenant with the Minnesota State Patrol says there’s no way to know if seat belts would have made a difference in the crash. Still, one expert we spoke with couldn’t think of a single benefit of adding safety belts to his buses.

Jim Fey, with Students Transit Eau Claire, Inc., says about 15,000 students ride his buses each school day.

And Fey says the big buses are designed with your child’s safety in mind.

"They have higher backed seats that are padded and they also give a little bit, so in the course of an impact, those seats absorb, along with the vehicle itself, will absorb some of the impact,” Fey said.

In fact, Fey says seat belts on buses could actually cause more harm than good. For one, he says they could make it difficult to get kids out of the bus in an emergency. Then there’s this concern…

"Maybe it would be used as a weapon,” Fey said. “Where they could take that seat belt and whap someone else with the buckle itself."

Even troopers with the Minnesota State Patrol agree that big yellow buses are the way to go.

"School buses are still a safe means of travel for your children to go to school,” Lt. Mark Peterson said. “And we would still recommend. I think school systems and bus drivers take great pride in their work and what they do."

"It's a tragedy of course that the 4 students were lost in that accident, but in the whole realm of the millions of students that ride a bus everyday to and from school, it is still the safest form of land transportation known to man,” Fey said.

Federal figures show an average of six children are killed on U.S. school buses each year.