Thursday, November 25, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

TRAFFIC SAFETY: Highway fatalities soar

With record in deaths already set, troopers bracing for holiday

I-15 traffic flows north into Las Vegas on Wednesday for the long holiday weekend. The Highway Patrol has handled 100 traffic fatalities this year. The previous record of 92 was set in 2002. Photo by John Gurzinski.

Christopher D. Brown didn't live to see Thanksgiving, but his name will live in the Highway Patrol record books.

The 29-year-old Henderson man died Sunday running across Interstate 15, and in doing so became the 100th fatality this year on Southern Nevada's highways.

With that dismal record already set, troopers braced for the rush of traffic during the busy holiday travel season, when more than 228,000 Nevadans are expected to hit the road.

"We had four fatals last weekend," trooper Angie Chavera said. "I hope we don't have that this weekend."

The 100 fatalities handled by the Highway Patrol broke the record of 92 set in 2002. That number dipped to 79 last year but rebounded with a vengeance, surpassing last year's mark in September on the way to the century mark.

Las Vegas police also are nearing a record number of fatal traffic accidents. Their total stood at 125 Tuesday, just short of the record of 128 set two years ago.

At that pace, Sgt. Frank Weigand expected the record to top 140.

Las Vegas-area troopers blamed a combination of growth and bad driving for the rising number of fatalities on highways in Clark County and in the fringes of Nye County.

Many of the deadliest areas were rural stretches of highway, especially the busy route of I-15 between California and Las Vegas. Seventeen people died in crashes along that 34-mile stretch, many of them in single-vehicle wrecks.

Eight more people died on I-15 from the Las Vegas Speedway to the Arizona border.

As of Wednesday, about one-third of the Highway Patrol's fatalities, 37, were along I-15. U.S. Highway 95 came in second with 22 fatalities. State Route 160, which connects Pahrump to Las Vegas, had 14 deaths, and the Las Vegas Beltway tallied 10 fatal wrecks.

The rest of the deaths happened along other state roads and highways, including those leading to Mount Charleston and Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

Half of the fatal crashes involved a drunken driver or pedestrian, and half of the victims were not wearing seat belts.

Seat belt use was worst on Route 160, where two-thirds of those killed were unrestrained, and the Las Vegas Beltway, where 75 percent of the victims wore no seat belt.

The patrol's crash statistics showed that three of every four fatal wrecks involved one vehicle.

Many of the crashes, especially those in rural areas, were caused by drivers losing control of their vehicles or falling asleep behind the wheel, Chavera said.

"Sleepy drivers are just as dangerous as drunk drivers," she said.

One trend that perplexed troopers was a cluster of pedestrian fatalities on I-15 near Tropicana Avenue. Four people have died this year trying to cross there. At least two of the victims were intoxicated, the patrol said.

Chavera said the growing number of cars in Las Vegas was mostly to blame for the rising fatalities but said that troopers' efforts to catch traffic violators and decrease accidents was hampered by staffing shortages.

"We need some manpower to change these numbers," said Sgt. Darren Reimer, chief of the fatal-crash investigation team. "We need to be proactive out there on the road."

The patrol's Las Vegas office is 29 troopers short, about 35 percent below full staffing, Chavera said.

The shortage curtails the patrol's ability to catch traffic violators and maintain a visual presence on the highways, she said.

In September, Nevada troopers joined the California Highway Patrol for a three-week operation along I-15. The only fatality during that period came during the last day of the operation, Chavera said.

"We can't stop everything," she said. "But if we're out there, can we make a difference? Absolutely."