Ohio Car Accident News: Driver Fatigue is Second Leading Cause of Auto Accidents
Ohio car accident news reports driver fatigue is the second leading cause of all Ohio auto accidents.
We all know how important sleep is, but some Ohio car accident statistics show that American’s may not get enough sleep as as they should. In todays day an age of running here and running there, eating at 8 O’clock a t night and having to do homework. Most of us are not getting enough sleep and this can be dangerous not only to our physical health but on the road as well. When we drive we need all our senses awake and aware. The fact show driver fatigue the second leading cause of Ohio auto accidents in the state of Ohio.
Ohio Car Accidents and Driver Fatigue
Ohio driver fatigue statistics and Ohio auto accidents are all too high. In 2011, the Ohio Department of Public Safety published in their annual Ohio Crash Facts report that fatigue and falling asleep at the wheel was the second leading cause of Ohio auto accidents in the state. In fact, only drunk driving and driving under the influence caused more accidents. The yet-to-be-completed report for ODPS report for 2012 shows the same thing-that of the 459,034 total crashes in Ohio last year, 2,747 were caused by fatigued drivers whose condition caused the death of 9 people and injured 1,382 more.
Fatigued drivers cause hundreds of thousands of Ohio car accidents every year, injuring and killing thousands of people. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimated that of all police-reported car accidents that occur each year, 100,000 of them are caused by driver fatigue. A poll taken in 2005 by the National Sleep Foundation found that out of all adults drivers surveyed, 60 percent of them, nearly 168 million people, said they had driven a while feeling drowsy. 103 million of them reported actually falling asleep at the wheel. (https://drowsydriving.org/about/facts-and-stats/) The NHTSA is advising that if you feel any signs drowsiness or driver fatigue you should pull off the road immediately. This action will protect yourself and others on the road from a potential auto accident.
Some signs of driver fatigue include:
- Heavy eyelids
- Constant yawning
- Frequent blinking
- Trouble concentrating
- Head nodding
- Lane drifting
- Feelings of irritability
- Wandering thoughts
In a study by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, researchers were surprised to learn that fatigue was actually the cause of up to 20 percent of all vehicle accidents. In fact, Charlie Klauer, at the Institute’s Center for Vulnerable Road User Safety, said “The study allowed us, for the first time, to observe driver behavior just prior to a crash. In 20 percent of all crashes and 16 percent of all near crashes, the driver was showing fatigue. We saw eye-lid closure, head bobbing, severe loss of facial musculature, micro sleep – which is when your eyes drift shut and then pop up. ..This was not just yawning. The drivers were asleep,” Virginia Tech News reported. Klauer said that another surprising discovery was the amount of fatigue that drivers had during the day. “We found significantly more crashes/near crashes due to fatigue during the day than at night.”
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