The Three Most Common Causes of Fatal Car Accidents

From the time you got up this morning to the time you get up tomorrow, 90 people will have died in fatal auto accidents. That’s a fatality every 13 minutes. To make matters more concerning, the frequency of accidents, period, is likely much worse since about 10 million accidents go unreported each year.

Here are a few of the most common reasons why there are so many accidents, according to the latest statistics on car accidents.

Drunk Driving As you might have assumed, drunk driving is one of the most common causes of fatal car accidents in the United States. In fact, Mothers Against Drunk Driving estimate that there’s about 300,000 incidents of drunk driving every day. Drunk driving is so problematic that it actually causes about 32% of fatal car accidents every year, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. This means that about 33 people will die today because of drunk driving.

Speeding Speeding, believe it or not, is also one of the most common causes of fatal car accidents. Though it might not seem that bad, speeding decreases a driver’s reaction time, making them less likely to avoid an accident. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, speeding causes about one third of all car accidents in America.

Texting Distracted driving is the single most common cause of fatal car accidents in America, and its worst form is easily texting. When people text while driving, they increase their risk of getting into fatal car accidents by 23 times. Though many people think that they’re great texters, the actual act is inherently unsafe. Texting requires a person to look at their phone for a minimum of five seconds. In that time, a person traveling at 55 miles per hour will have traveled the length of an entire football field without looking at the road.

If you do your best to avoid these common causes of car accidents, you’ll greatly reduce your likelihood of becoming involved in one. So long as you don’t drink and drive, speed, or text while driving, you’re much less likely to be involved in any fatal car accidents. If you have any questions about deadly car accidents, feel free to ask in the comments.