HIGHWAY SUICIDE
OUR NEWEST HAZARD
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Twilight had settled on a highway near Madison, Wis., as
a salesman began the last leg of his homeward trip. An
experienced and cautious motorist, the father of two, he was
driving about 55 miles an hour along familiar roadway. Sud
denly, for a reason still unknown, his auto veered onto the
-shoulder, lurched momentarily back toward the pavement
edge,"then flipped upward on two wheels, jumped the ditch,
and smashed against a tree.
The driver died instantly.
Hardly a dramatic accident Certainly, a far cry from rend
ing grand-slam collisions normally associated with our yearly
traffic toll of 40,000 deaths and 1,400,000 injuries.
Yet, though collisions kill and mightily it is not the high
speed two-car smashup which alone perturbs safety experts
today. Rather, their fastest-growing problem is the increas
ing regularity with which a motorist,
with no other car around him, careens
off the road to his death!
Of all traffic deaths in 1957, the Na
tional Safety Council reports, some
14,000 nearly two of every five were
in autos untouched by another car. Per
haps more startling, on nonurban high
ways, where three-fourths of all traf
fic fatalities occur, careening-off-the-roadway
mishaps were ttoice as deadly
as head-on collisions and sideswipes
combined!
Thus, the odds are nearing 50-50 that
if you die on the highway, it won't be
due to the "other guy" at all. Your
killer will be yourself! How?
All too readily, statistics show, you
may fall asleep and veer out of control
into a ditch, viaduct, pole, or tree. You
may turn a radio dial, light a cigarette,
close a window, eat a sandwich, take off
your hat, quiet a youngster, steal a kis,
or look at a road map and in that
split second you could be doomed!
You may hit a hole, a bump, a tree
limb, a hubcap, a soft shoulder, or skid
in the rain or on gravel. You may round
a corner too fast, decide to make a turn
too late, misjudge a curve, or shoot
over a hilltop too suddenly to stop for
an unexpected obstacle. You may have
had "one too many," or you may simply
become dreamy from fatigue or "turn
pike hypnosis."
Forty times every day roughly twice every hour death
needs no more than any one of these invitations.
Too easily, records mutely testify, a situation arises from
which you cannot or don't know how to extricate yourself
in the brief seconds that fate allows. Too readily, the move
you make proves wrong, with life as the forfeit.
"The puzzling question," says James Stannard Baker, re
search director of the Northwestern University Traffic Insti
tute, "is why. Divided highways, we know, are cutting col
lisions, making the one-car accident our most ominous prob
lem for the future."
What's known about the problem now? Speed seemingly
is a fatal ingredient, but not in the proportion you would
assume for more than half of all highway fatalities involve
speeds under 50 miles an hour, and this is considered to be
Family Weekly. November 11, I960
Every driver owes
it to himself to heed
the advice in this
eye-opening report
on one-car accidents
By ALFRED BALK
a "moderate" figure for most open-road driving today.
Nor are bad roads to blame. A Pennsylvania Turnpike
motorist, for example, veered off a straight section of high
way at 60 miles an hour committing suicide while picking
up his sunglasses.
Nor is it inexperienced drivers. A soldier who had just won
a military driving award, for instance, went to sleep at the
wheel in Missouri, killing himself and two buddies because
they tried to go too far on a weekend pass.
Top traffic researchers have hung a priority tag on studies
of this problem. Among them are Dr. Herbert J. Stark, of
the New York University Safety Center; Dr. John O. Moore,
head of Cornell University's Crash Injury Research Founda
tion; the National Safety Council, and others.
State highway departments in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin.
California, and Ohio also have made
analyses. Their recommendations, still
tentative to date, include these:
1, Beware of excessive speed not 70
or 60 or 50 mph, but speed relative to
road conditions or potential .hazards.
Never get complacent, even at "moder
ate" speeds.
2. Be 100 percent attentive on every
type of highway, turnpike, two-lane
state road, or unimproved back roads.
Surprisingly, the odds are roughly the
same on each type of highway.
3i Don't begin a trip if you're fa
tigued before getting behind the wheel.
Driver error is the cause of virtually
every one-car accident. It increases
with fatigue; careening-off-the-road
mishaps always zoom on weekends,
when drives are longer, even if traffic
is light!
4i Be equally careful in daylight or
darkness, good weather or bad. Six
tenths of all deaths in one-car smashups
on turnpikes occur in daytime; mom
than half of these mishaps occur on dry
pavement under fair skies.
5i Be watchful on every curve or
when turning onto another roadway.
Speed "creeps up" and can easily throw
you on a turn.
6i Be fully alert for the unexpected
even on a straight road and know
what to do. In a skid, don't slam on your brakes; turn with the
skid and let the car right itself, or you will roll. If you have
a blowout, or a wheel drops onto the shoulder, never try
to "yank" yourself back until you've slowed to a safe speed.
7t Know your limitations. You are most susceptible to
careening off the road if you're under 25, inexperienced, have
been drinking, or are seriously worried or emotionally upset.
But middle-aged, experienced, sober, unruffled drivers dir
due to inattention or the same judgment errors, too. Every
motorist could profit from a good driver-training course.
Don't carry over expressway speeds to other roads. Stop
driving when you find your car weaving, or road signs and
cars pass by before you are aware of them.
In short, beware of the "other guy" but be most con
cerned about yourself! t