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Show Automobile Accident Deaths Continue to Mount Automobile accidents last year in this country resulted in the death of 29,900 persons and the injury of 850,700, thus bringing the total - of deaths for the last four years up to nearly 125,000 and the number of persons injured non-fatally up to around 4,000,000. The record of fatalities for last year was 2.5 per cent greater than in 1932, but on a per accident basis the deaths increased 5.9 per cent and the number of persons injured non-fatally 2.2 per cent. These and other facts relating to the street and highway accident problem of last year are brought out in the new analysis entitled "The Great American Gamble" just published by The Travelers Insurance Company. Com-pany. Collisions 'between automobiles last year accounted for nearly 45 .the trend of deaths from automobile automo-bile accidents is shown in a study , analyzing last year's experience on : the basis of the location of mishaps, i The rate of death per accident be-j be-j tween intersections was 67 per cent worse than at street intersections, ;and this difference is attributed to j the higher speeds . usually prevail-iing prevail-iing between intersections. At rural j intersections the rate of death per accident was 144 per cent greater than at street intersections, and I again the higher rate of speed prevailing pre-vailing on highways is cited as the principal cause of the difference. On highways the rate of death per accident last year was 118 per cent greater than the average for all accidents ac-cidents combined, and was 167 per cent greater than the death rate between street intersections. On curves the death rate ter accident per cent or an tne acciaents, dui, these resulted in slightly less than 24 per cent of the fatalities. Automobile-pedestrian collissions comprised com-prised 37 per cent of all accidents, but these resulted in approximately approximate-ly 45 per cent of the deaths. In addition to the fatalities numbering 13,440 due to automobile-pedestrian accidents, 262,270 persons were injured in-jured non-i'atally in such accidents. Practically two-thirds of the 756,-500 756,-500 personal injury accidents which occurred last year were due in some degree to driving errors. Among these, exceeding the speed limit resulted in the greatest number num-ber of deaths. Although the number num-ber of accidents from this cause accounted ac-counted for about one-fourth of all the mishaps which involved improper im-proper motoring practices, the fatalities fatal-ities comprised approximately one-third one-third of all deaths resulting from was 126 per cent greater than the average and at railroad crossings the death rate per accident was nearly 700 per cent worse than the average of all accidents combined. Last year 573,200 accidents which occurred between street intersections intersec-tions and at street intersections resulted re-sulted in 14,320 deaths. Between rural Intersections and on highways 139,880 accidents resulted in 11,130 deaths. Thus it is shown that the rate of death per accident on the highways was 219 per cent greater than on city streets, and the relatively rela-tively high rates of speed maintained main-tained on highways are regarded as the main factor in the greater severity sever-ity of rural accidents. Accidents which happen during darkness continued last year to be far worse than daytime accidents. During the normal daylight hours of 6 a. m. to 6 p. m., there were 413,890 automobile accidents . last year which resulted in 13,670 deaths. During the normal hours of darkness dark-ness from 6 p. m. to 6 a. m. there were 342,610 accidents which resulted re-sulted in 16,230 deaths. The important im-portant fact brought out Is that the rate of death per accident was 43.5 per cent worse during the hours of darkness than during the hours of daylight. Automobile accidents during hours' of darkness ar? much worse in their consequences than those of day-i day-i light because cars at night are be-jing be-jing driven too fast for the existing' I range of visibility afforded by head-j head-j lamps. When dependent solely on' i car illumination the safe oneration 0f automobiles at night demands ; that speed never exceed the stop-pine stop-pine distance of approximately 100 jfset provided by effective range of j (Continued On Page 4) driving errors. Statistics show that the rate of death per accident involving in-volving excessive speed was 28 per cent greater than the average; operating op-erating on the wrong side of the road, 6 per cent greater; passing standing street car, nearly 2 per cent; going off roadways, 58 per cent greater, and reckless driving, nearly 37 per cent greater than the average. The analysis of actions of pedestrians pedes-trians involved in accidents last year shows that in many instances pedestrians took their own lives in their hands. More than 800 were killed in crossing intersections against signals and 360 met death crossing intersections diagonally. More than 3,300 pedestrians were killed because of crossing streets between intersections and 1,460 met death darting out into streets from behind parked cars, while 2.250 were killed while walking along rural highways. The figures show also that 1,680 children were killed while j playing in the street, j The experience of pedestrians show that the rate of death per au-: tomobile-pedestrian accident was 28 per cent better at intersections than between intersections and 25 per cent better in crossing intersections with the signal than against the signal. The most dangerous thing that a pedestrian can do is to walk on a country highway, as the rate of death per pedestrian accident on highways is nearly 360 per cent worse than the average death rate for all automobile-pedestrian collis-j ions combined. Of the total of 29.900 persons! killed in automobile accidents la.st year, the statistics developed by The Travelers show 1,630 deaths of children under the age of four, and 3,220 deaths under, the age of fourteen. four-teen. More than 41.000 children under un-der the age rf- four were injured and nearly 139.000 under the age of fourteen. Under the acre of four the rate of death per injury last year was 12 per cent greater than the average for all ages combined and in the ages of 65 years and over it was 280 per cent worse. In the ten-year -period ending 1933 the number of persons killed in automobile accidents, exclusive of motorcycle mishans. ha.s totaled lli.Wl. of which toll nearly 125.000 have bepn killed in the last four years. On the basis of this four-I four-I year record It Is octlmato tvqr f-r, 'the remainder of the present dee-i dee-i ade there will be nearlv 190, onn -fatalities, or a total for the dB"nd- of around 315.000 killer!, and armrnv. jimately ten million nersons injured. I Thus in the ten-year pprlod it Is , nointed out that tho number of j rvwile killed bv ai'tomobiles wmiir! exceed America's record of soldier Vi'iVd during all the history of his' country, ard would siiras; th" f-tal battle casualties of the American J Eywditionarv Forces In the World , War mor? than six times. Th" nimhpr of TworK In lured non-j fa tat! v from automobl'e accidents during the wvsnt deoade would ex-j ceed bv more than fifty times the, A. E. Fs record of soldiers wounded non-fatally in action. The rerious effect which increasing increas-ing rates of speed are having upon! AUTOMOBILE ACCIDENT DEATHS CONTINUE TO MOUNT (Continued From Page 1) car lamps. This distance corresponds corres-ponds to 35 miles per hour, j The experience of young, drivers, according to the record last year, continues bad. The ratio of young drivers in fatal accidents to the total of such drivers in all mishaps last year was 62 per cent worse than the average for all drivers. Statistics Statis-tics on the number of persons killed by age groups in automobile accidents acci-dents for the ten-year period ending in 1931 show that in the ages of 15 to 19 the rate of death has Increased In-creased 165 per cent and in the ages of 20 to 24 the Increase has amounted to 185 per cent. The average aver-age increase for all ages combined has been 96 per cent. Only In the ages of 5 to 9 has there been an improvement, the decrease in the rate of death amounting to 10 per cent. The complete summary of the extent ex-tent of automobile accidents and their causes for last year, as published pub-lished by The Travelers Insurance Company in its new booklet, emphasizes em-phasizes the dangerous factor of too much speed. In the last ten years it Is pointed out that there has been an increase from 35 to around 55 miles per hour in rated driving speed. In three well-known cars of different prices there have been increases in the last ten years in horsepower from 20 to more than 90 in the low price class; 70 to 116 horsepower in the medium price class, and 84 to 160 horsepower horse-power in the high price class. It is pointed out that automobiles traveling at 20, 40 and 60 miles per hours have the same capacity for Inflicting damage, that the same cars would have If driven off a one, four and ten or twelve-story building. build-ing. At 20 miles per hour, because of the distance required to stop at that speed, a car occupies 38 feet of roadway in addition to its own length. At 40 miles per hour this length is Increased to 126 feet of roadway, and at 60 miles per hour, because of the stepping distance necessaij, a car occupies 263 fe?t of roadway, in addition to its own length. |