Drivers Warned to be Vigilant During the "101 Deadliest Days on the Road"; Families at Greatest Risk of Fatal Crashes Memorial Day Through Labor Day

Washington, D.C. - 5/26/2004

The 101 days from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day are the deadliest days on the road, with more fatal crashes and more children and teens dying than at any other time of the year. That’s the finding of a new report by a national coalition of driving safety advocacy groups urging families to adopt survival strategies to avoid family tragedies this summer. 

“We are entering the time of year when Americans pack up everything most precious to them -- their families -- and take to the road, traveling more than one trillion miles,” said Susan Pikrallidas, AAA’s Vice President of Public Affairs. “For most, it will be a time of happy memories, but for thousands of families, their trip will end in needless tragedy. We need to change that.”

The report, by “Drive for Life” -- an initiative of the AAA, Volvo Cars of North America, and Partners for Highway Safety, in cooperation with a number of law enforcement and highway safety groups -- details six factors that contribute to fatal crashes and provides survival strategies to keep families safe. Among the major contributors to summer crashes are failure to wear safety belts or use child safety seats properly, drinking and driving, fatigue, car maintenance failures, speed, and distractions. The full report, with detailed information about survival strategies and an array of highway safety information is available at the initiative’s website: www.driveforlife.com.

Among the report’s major findings are:

• Americans travel more than one trillion miles in summer – that’s an extra 10.5 million miles per month.
• More children die in motor vehicle deaths in summer, with crashes being the No. 1 cause of children’s deaths.
• Teen traffic deaths also peak in summer, when teens log significantly more hours behind the wheel and are much more likely to drive at night -- many, for the first time.
• Children are more likely to be on the road with their parents in summer -- traveling longer distances, at night and for longer stretches at a time.
• Parents driving with children are more likely to drive fatigued and at night, when they are most likely to meet up with a drunk driver.

“We pride ourselves on building the safest vehicles that we can engineer. But driver behavior is the other essential part of keeping families safe on the road,” said Vic Doolan, President and CEO of Volvo Cars of North America, LLC. “We hope this report will serve as a wake-up call for families to approach driving a little differently and to keep their families safer on the road this summer.”

What’s a family to do? Paul Burris, director of Partners for Highway Safety, urged drivers to develop summer safety plans and make a commitment to safer habits when taking to the road with their families this summer. Among the key behaviors are buckling up, making sure child safety seats are installed properly and keeping older children in booster seats for longer, doing some basic car maintenance before heading out on a trip, and avoiding distractions.

“Families can significantly improve their prospects for a safe trip by avoiding distractions when they take their families on the road, and driving only when they are at their physical best – not when they are tired, sick or after drinking alcohol,” Burris said. “Especially when your children are in the seat behind you, turn off the cell phone, put down the sandwich, face the road and give driving your full attention. Don’t let anything distract you – including the kids.”

The report also highlighted a number of factors as major contributors to family fatalities and crashes on the road. These include:

• Improper Use of Restraints. While safety belt use is at an all-time high and child safety seats have dramatically reduced child deaths, still up to 75 percent of child safety seats are improperly installed. And the 20 percent of drivers who don’t buckle up are at much higher risk of not properly buckling up their children.
• Alcohol use. Two of every three children killed in an alcohol-related crash were riding with a driver who had been drinking, but who was not necessarily drunk. Nearly a third of teen drivers killed on the road had been drinking. Families are most likely to encounter a drunk driver between midnight and 3 a.m., when they may be trying to cover some miles while children are asleep.
• Fatigue. In the past five years, 1.35 million drivers attributed crashes to drowsiness. Those crashes are more likely to be serious and occur on high-speed roads, and the drivers often do not attempt to avoid the crash. During summer, families with children were six times more likely to drive home from a long day trip while fatigued than people without children: 57 percent said they are likely to drive when fatigued to get home from a weekend getaway and 59 percent said they are likely to drive fatigued to get to a destination in one night.
• Car maintenance. Neglected maintenance leads to 2,600 deaths annually, nearly 100,000 disabling injuries and more than $2 billion in lost wages, medical expenses and property damage. Under-inflating or over-inflating tires can result in serious injuries. In the summer, tires are especially vulnerable, because long trips, heavy loads, higher temperatures and higher speeds put additional stress on tires.
• Speed. Most crashes occur at 40 mph or less, but most fatal crashes occur at top speeds. Speeding was a contributing factor in at least 30 percent of all fatal crashes, and more than 13,000 lives a year are lost in speeding-related crashes. At least eight in 10 drivers admit to speeding at least monthly on each road type.
• Distractions. More than 1.5 million police-reported crashes involved some kind of driver distraction. More than seven million drivers involved in a crash attributed it to distractions, and 292,000 cited talking on a cell phone. Most drivers admit to engaging in one more activity while driving, including eating (59 percent), talking on a cell phone (37 percent) and even reading (14 percent). Other common distractions are talking to passengers (81 percent), changing radio stations or CDs (66 percent) or dealing with children in the backseat (24 percent).

To further raise awareness, Volvo Cars of North America will give away one of America's safest SUVs: The Volvo XC90, featuring the world's first gyroscopic roll stability control system to help prevent rollovers. To enter the sweepstakes and gain a chance to win the XC90, licensed drivers may take the “101- Day Survival Quiz” at www.driveforlife.com to qualify for the contest.

Burris, of Partners for Highway Safety, said the educational effort will continue throughout the summer. He said Drive for Life will conduct another national poll of driver behaviors and attitudes, to be released in late summer, and the initiative also will air a new national 30-minute television special, “Drive for Life: The National Safe Driving Test 2004” on PAX-TV on Saturday, Sept. 4 at 7 p.m., during the height of Labor Day Weekend.

As North America’s largest motoring and leisure travel organization, AAA provides its 47 million members with travel, insurance, financial and automotive-related services. Since its founding in 1902, the not-for-profit, fully tax-paying AAA has been a leader and advocate for the safety and security of all travelers.

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