Category: Safety Topics

  • May 26th, 2020

In 2008, 292 people were killed and another 18,000 injured when motorists attempted the most dangerous driving stunt permitted outside of a closed-course test track: backing up. Children under age five, who comprise 44% of all backup fatalities, were most likely to pay the price when things went wrong. From the perspective of the engineer, […]

  • May 22nd, 2020

Bad assumptions make data from Weeks 1-14 insufficient. Please see accurate data from Week 15 forward.  It is Week 11 of the coronavirus pandemic, and total crash data is still showing a decline in Alabama. Overall, crashes have declined to less than 40% of their pre-COVID levels, INCLUDING speed-involved and fatal crashes, but are now […]

  • May 21st, 2020

U.S. highways have been emptier during the coronavirus pandemic, but they have also been more deadly, according to statistics released Wednesday. According to the latest Alabama crash reports, our deaths this year as of May 21, 2020, are 10% lower than this day in 2019.  However, the fatality rate per mile had increased significantly, as it has […]

  • May 21st, 2020

Synthetic drugs, also referred to as designer or club drugs, are chemically-created in a lab to mimic another drug such as marijuana, cocaine, or morphine. The resulting designer drugs typically have a new different effect on the brain or behavior. Because these drugs are created in illegal labs, their ingredients and strength are almost impossible […]

  • May 21st, 2020

The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance’s (CVSA) confirmed that Operation Safe Driver Week will take place as scheduled and will target drivers who exceed the speed limit. For the second year in a row, the area of emphasis for Operation Safe Drive Week will be on speeding by both commercial vehicle drivers and passenger vehicle drivers. […]

  • May 19th, 2020

The purpose of this research was to explore candidate booster performance metrics that have the potential to identify less effective booster systems. A combination of volunteer testing of belt fit and posture along with dynamic sled tests of booster seats was employed to achieve the project goals. Posture and belt fit were measured in 24 […]

  • May 15th, 2020

Bad assumptions make data from Weeks 1-14 insufficient. Please see accurate data from Week 15 forward.  It is Week 10 of the coronavirus pandemic, and total crash data is still showing a decline in Alabama. Overall, crashes declined to less than 40% of their pre-COVID levels, INCLUDING speed-involved and fatal crashes, but are now showing […]

  • May 15th, 2020

There are more fatal crashes during the days surrounding Independence Day than the rest of the year, according to an analysis of state traffic records by researchers at The University of Alabama. A study by the Center for Advanced Public Safety (CAPS) at UA showed that during the past five years (2015-2019), the five days […]

  • May 14th, 2020

In 2019, seat belt use in the United States ranged from 70.7 percent in New Hampshire to 97.1 percent in Hawaii. Twenty-six States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Northern Mariana Islands achieved seat belt use rates of 90 percent or higher. These results are from probability-based observational surveys conducted by the 50 States, the […]

  • May 14th, 2020

This project included four distinct but related exploratory studies of data sources that could improve roadway safety analysis. The first effort evaluated passively gathered crowdsourced bicyclist activity data from StreetLight Data and found promising correlations (R2 of 62% and 69% for monthly weekday and weekend daily averages) when the StreetLight data were compared to bicyclist […]