The Number of Traffic Crash Fatalities Caused by Vehicles Running Red Lights Has Hit a 10-Year High
A new written report conducted by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety reports that more drivers are running crimson lights, too those incidents are resulting inward a higher number of serious in addition to fatal automobile crashes. The written report was reported in a United States of America Today article, which explains that “deaths from drivers running ruby-red lights reached a ten-twelvemonth high inwards 2017.” To put that in some other perspective, traffic fatalities from running carmine lights was at a marked depression inward 2009, with 715 people killed. By 2017, that number had risen by a shocking 31%, alongside 939 people killed because drivers ran cherry-red lights.
People who accept been killed by drivers running ruby lights include motor vehicle occupants in addition to pedestrians exterior the vehicle, together with occupants inwards the vehicle that ran the red calorie-free. According to Jake Nelson, manager of traffic safety advocacy and enquiry for the AAA Foundation, there are “at to the lowest degree ii people killed every day at the hands of drivers blowing through reddish lights.”
Although researchers did not specifically analyze the reasons that the rate of drivers running cherry-red lights has increased, experts at the AAA Foundation make accept more or less suspicions nigh what has caused this spike, including only not express to the next:
- People inwards the U.southward. are driving more, with a five% increment of full miles traveled betwixt 2008 and 2017; together with
- Distracted driving in addition to the rising of smartphone use leads more than drivers to run reddish lights without intending to make then (equally opposed to speeding through a carmine calorie-free intentionally).
More than l% of the people killed inward scarlet calorie-free crashes “were non the ruddy-light running drivers, not their passengers, but were other people who they striking,” according to AAA.
Learning More About Red Light Accidents
It is important to sympathize the severity of the situation. The following are statistics from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS):
- Red calorie-free cameras make not always discourage cherry-red-light running merely tin can assistance (with or so cities seeing a turn down in reddish low-cal accidents of near 20% where red calorie-free cameras exist);
- About 132,000 people sustain injuries inwards ruby-red low-cal accidents every yr;
- A motorist volition work a blood-red low-cal, on average, at least in one case every twenty minutes at an intersection, and that number is higher during pinnacle travel times; together with
- 43% of drivers acknowledge to running a ruby-red low-cal in the terminal xxx days even though 93% of all adult drivers order it is unacceptable to run a blood-red calorie-free.
If yous or someone y'all beloved got hurt in a crash involving person who ran a crimson calorie-free, yous should discuss your options alongside a auto accident lawyer.
