Fatal Motor Vehicle Accidents

Ensuring that children are kept safe while in a moving vehicle is right up there with necessities like providing them with food and shelter. Unfortunately, thousands of children are injured in motor vehicle crashes each year, making it the leading cause of death for children ages 1 to 13 years old. Different ages mean different safety rules Buying a car seat and correctly installing it is an important step in decreasing the risks of injury or death. Practicing safe usage of seatbelts is also important for older kids. Parents need

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The National Transportation Safety Board has issued a series of recommendations to improve pedestrian safety here in the U.S. The board is alarmed by the fact that there is a 46 percent increase in pedestrian fatalities between 2009 and 2016. A total is 16 deaths per day added up to 5,987 in 2016. Moreover, pedestrian deaths make up approximately 21 percent of all motor vehicle fatalities. Here in Maryland, there were 104 pedestrian deaths involving motor vehicles in 2016, which is 1.73 pedestrian deaths per 100,000. This is 29 percent

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It is not New Years Eve or July 4th. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), the most dangerous day of the year to drive is August 2. This calculation is based on the fact that the highest number of motor vehicle related deaths (505) on one specific day occurred on August 2 from 2012 to 2016. Similarly, August is also the most dangerous month of the year to drive with 15,914 fatalities during that same period of years. This will be a revelation for nearly everyone. Drivers

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We can’t control the weather. If we could, someone would turn off the rain spigot that has been drenching Montgomery County and the rest of the Washington metro area for the past week and bring an end to the precipitation. Lacking power to change meteorological facts doesn’t mean we are off the hook when it comes to safety in public. Drivers, pedestrians, bicyclists all have an extra duty of care when conditions make the going tough. Failure to do so can be seen as negligence and if disregard results in serious

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Self-driving cars, once merely a futuristic fantasy, may soon appear on roadways nationwide. Several auto manufacturers are designing autonomous vehicles, test-driving them and even sending them out into the world. Self-driving cars are still rare on public roads, but may soon become widespread. The inception of self-driving cars has raised several important issues. Two weeks ago, a woman was struck and killed by a Volvo that was in autonomous mode. Her death raised issues of safety, insurance and responsibility. Who is responsible? One of the biggest issues surrounding self-driving cars

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As all drivers should know, distracted driving can be incredibly dangerous. Every year, about 27,000 people in the United States are injured or killed as a result of distracted driving. Drivers should also know that it is illegal in most states, and Maryland is no exception. Distracted driving can cover a wide range of activities, from texting to changing the radio dial. It may not be possible to outlaw every single activity that can contribute to distracted driving, but Maryland has made a concerted effort to reduce it wherever possible.

Continue reading What are Maryland’s laws—and penalties—for distracted driving?…

If you were to guess, which weather condition do you think is most deadly: Tornadoes, earthquakes, floods or snow? You may have guessed one of the first three, with good reason—those weather hazards are indeed dangerous. But snow is actually responsible for more deaths than all of the other conditions combined. That is because snow can lead to deadly traffic accidents—about 800 in the United States every year. There are many other facts that you should know about deadly winter accidents—so we have compiled a list of important statistics that you

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A researcher from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) wants Americans to know that traffic crashes are the single most common cause of death among teens in the United States. That’s shocking, but it’s not inevitable. There are concrete steps that we can take to reduce teen crash rates. Those steps include education, engineering and enforcement. “Teen drivers, particularly novice ones, are overrepresented in U.S. fatality and injury crash statistics. The extraordinarily high teen crash rates are unacceptable and it is our core mission to save lives,” said the expert, who

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The data for 2016 is in from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the news is somewhat troubling. While fatalities from distracted drivers dipped by 2.2 percent last year, overall traffic deaths rose for the second straight year. NHTSA cites other forms of risky behavior including speeding, failure to wear seatbelts and drunk driving as responsible for the increase. The safety agency estimates that 37, 461 people were killed in motor vehicle accidents last year. That’s the highest number since 2007. Fatal crashes increased by 5.6 percent over 2015,

Continue reading Distracted driving deaths down, fatalities up from risky driving…

While many think of summer as a time to unwind, parents of teenage drivers have a much more sobering statistic to consider: a greater number of teens are killed in auto accidents during the hundred days following Memorial Day than any another time period of the year. This may sound like a jarring statement, but it is meant to bring awareness to the fact that over 5,000 youthful drivers were killed in auto accidents during the same time period of days between 2010 and 2014. And that figure is only increasing. According

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