Holiday fatalities higher than last year

Seven people died in seven separate traffic crashes statewide over the Fourth of July holiday weekend, according to Michigan State Police Lt. Gary Megge. While this number is higher than last year’s Fourth of July weekend, which had four traffic-related deaths according to the Michigan State Police’s traffic services division, Megge said the numbers are not a reason to worry about road safety.

“We have to remember that there are about a thousand fatalities in the state on the road per year,” Megge said. “In a three-and-a-half day reporting period, seven is by no means an extremely high number.”

The holiday weekend also was a longer time span than last year’s, said Jim Rink, spokesman for AAA Michigan. Last year’s holiday, which fell on a Wednesday, was a span of 30 hours, while this year’s holiday weekend was more than 70 hours, he said.

Rink said there were more crashes even though less people were on the roads this holiday weekend because of a longer time span.

“There may have been less people on the road, but the holiday itself was more than twice as long,” he said. “There were more opportunities for crashes to take place.”

Four out of the seven people killed over the holiday weekend were not wearing safety belts even though Michigan’s safety belt use has reached 96.2 percent, a rate that is a record high, Rink said.

Megge said he would like to see even more people wearing their belts to help reduce fatalities.

“It kind of states the obvious that seat belts do save lives,” he said.

Out of the seven fatalities, one was alcohol related, a number that Megge said is a good sign that residents are working on being more aware of the dangers of driving while intoxicated.

“Law enforcement has spent a lot of time and effort in the last few years to reduce the number of drunk driving crashes,” he said. “We’re definitely moving in the right direction.”

The accidents occurred in seven different counties, ranging from the Upper Peninsula to Lenawee County, Megge said. They involved both younger and older drivers and occurred both in the morning and evening during the weekend, he said. Megge said that observing traffic statistics over the span of a few years, rather than a few months, helps obtain a more accurate perception of accident rate increase or decreases on the road.

“When we look at traffic crashes in statistics of a couple a day, comparing two or three days from last year, it’s not very accurate,” he said. “When we look at traffic crashes we want to look at two to three years of data before we can truly identify a trend in either direction.”

East Lansing police Capt. Kim Johnson said that East Lansing was serious accident-free over the holiday weekend, which ran from 6 p.m. Thursday through midnight on Sunday.

“It was very quiet of course,” Johnson said. “People tend to go other places; it’s a good thing for us.”