As can be seen from the table below, deaths on America's highways and roads have been averaging about 40,000 per year since 1990. If the US population is currently 270 million people that tells us that 1 out of every 6,750 people dies in a highway/motorway accident each and every year. That also means that over a period of 67.5 years (less than the average life span of people today) that the probability jumps to 1 out of a 100 that you will be killed in a highway accident!
Annual US Street & Highway Fatalities from 1990 through 1997
Year Total Number of Fatalities Vehicle Miles Traveled
(Hundreds of Millions)Fatality Rate (per 100 Million Vehicle Miles) 1990 44,529 21,475 2.07 1991 41,162 21,722 1.89 1992 39,235 22,398 1.75 1993 40,115 22,966 1.75 1994 40,676 23,600 1.72 1995 41,798 24,227 1.73 1996 41,907 24,858 1.69 1997 41,967 25,604 1.64 Data from Federal Highway Administration Compiled by WENDELL COX CONSULTANCY
Highway and Motorway Fact Book
(Wendell's complete Highway safety data from 1957 on is at:
http://www.publicpurpose.com/hwy-fatal57+.htm )
For some reason these numbers have been taken for granted by the driving public. We humans get a much more scared upon hearing about some one being killed by a shark, a bear or in an airplane crash. We don't seem the least bit concerned about the dangers of day-to-day driving.
Why does all this carnage on the highways happen and what are we doing wrong?
Basically, these accidents happen because cars crash into solid objects, other moving vehicles or people.
Lesson #1: Speed does not kill. Crashing kills!
Don't ever crash and you can go very fast without getting hurt. Space Shuttle astronauts orbit around the planet at 17,000 mph! Travel in the Concorde SST and you will be traveling at 1,200 mph. The Concorde SST fleet has been flying for 25 years without one "crash"! Some high speed surface trains, such as the famous French TGV, travels every day at 180 mph! Through 1998, commercial airlines in the United States went 18 straight months with zero fatalities. Also note that annually airlines have three times the passenger-miles of traffic as all automobiles in the United States. During this same 18 month period, when not one person died in a commercial airline flight, approximately 60,000 people died in highway accidents! Folks, there have only been a total of 13,000 commercial airline fatalities since 1914, the dawn of the airliner!
Star Trek's Spock would say it is very illogical to be scared of flying in an airplane and at the same time not be scared of driving around in your car.Now I have to start getting technical:
Lesson #2: Crashing does not kill. It's the sudden STOP that kills!It all has to do with the level of deceleration acting on the human body. The human body can only take so many g's of deceleration before it gets wrecked. Nowadays many people survive severe automobile crashes because they were properly restrained and modern cars have been designed to crush and absorb the impact energy over as long a crush distance as possible. Basically this reduces the average deceleration on the restrained occupants as they are slowed to a STOP from the full impact speed.
A perfect analogy is Hollywood stuntmen. How many times have you seen the bad guy get his just due by falling off a ten story building - and into an off-camera 15 foot thick giant bag of air. (These are not sealed balloons or the stuntman would rebound high into the air.) These special engineered "fall" bags are valved to let the air escape at a controlled rate after impact and spread out the STOP. It decelerates the stunt man from his peak falling speed over at least a 10 foot vertical distance, so the average g's are low. If the stuntman missed the bag and hit the non-yielding concrete, the deceleration g's would be extremely high (and very fatal) because the distance from peak speed to a full STOP would be less than an inch, instead of spread over a 10 feet distance.
Lesson #3: Humans are not high speed computers.
Humans can waste much of their potential emergency stopping distance just sensing and deciding whether or not what is happening in front of them merits a full on braking effort. Again, if one can get started braking earlier, the braking deceleration can be very gentle and still get one fully stopped with plenty of room to spare.
If the driver uses up most of the available distance thinking instead of acting by applying the brakes, then the probability of crashing increases. This is called reaction time and it varies from human to human.
Lesson #4: Humans do not pay 100% full attention while driving.
Driving is considered to be relaxing, enjoyable and fun (as long as you are not stuck in the rush hour congestion). Witness the theme of all automobile television commercials. We shouldn't have to pay 100% attention to driving and watching out and we don't. A national survey by Farmers Insurance Group, just completed in August of this year, found 1 in 20 men shaving and an equal number of women putting on makeup while driving in the morning rush hour. An equal number of men and women drivers, about 8%, were fixing their hair on the road. Yes, inattention is one of the leading causes of traffic collisions. Then there is talking on the cell phone, reading maps, tuning the radio, and changing tapes and CD's. This is not even considering drunks or drivers high on drugs.
Lesson #5: This is a dangerous planet.
Ice and snow on the road, rain slicked roads at night, thick fog and high gusty winds are fairly common events. Driving would be much safer for all if these hazards could be totally eliminated. All a car has for control is 12 square inches of rubber in contact with the road surface. It is a big mistake to happily drive along at 70 mph as if your car is solidly anchored to the ground.
Lesson #6: The machines themselves can be faulty.
The automobile industry spends millions of dollars testing every one of their products to insure safety. However, it has no real control of just how well these sophisticated machines will be maintained. Faulty machines are more the result of owner neglect than manufacturing defects. How often do each of us see a car with something as simple to fix as a burned out brake light bulb, a burned out headlight or a low tire? How often do we see a car pulled off to the side of the road that won't even run? These are all potential hazards to the rest of us - that should ideally be eliminated. It doesn't even consider the poorly maintained cars with dangerously unsatisfactory braking capability, bald tires, badly misaligned front suspensions, long ago worn out shock absorbers, etc.
