California Has the Highest Amount of Deadly Speeding Accidents
Excessive speed is one of the most common causes of motor vehicle accidents. Each year, speeding accidents account for more than $40 billion in damage. Even worse, car accidents involving excessive speed kill more than 10,000 people annually.
Speeds of 70 mph or higher are legal on some roads in 34 states in the United States. California’s highest posted limit is 70 mph on rural interstate highways and limited-access roads. However, a new report reveals that drivers in cities are ignoring the posted speed limit.
California Speeding Statistics
The Auto Insurance Center lists the 20 cities that have the highest average speeds involved in fatal car accidents. Of those 20 cities, 11 are in California. These are:
- Corona (with an average speed of 65.07 mph in lethal car accidents)
- Oakland (average speed of 64.04 mph)
- Victorville (62.71 mph)
- San Jose (61.49 mph)
- Hesperia (59 mph)
- San Bernardino (58.82 mph)
- Fresno (57.39 mph)
- Long Beach (56.18 mph)
- San Diego (56.15 mph)
- Stockton (55.08 mph)
- Sacramento (54.08 mph)
California also has three of the 20 roads with the highest average speed involved in fatal accidents:
- I-10 (average fatal accident speed of 68.86 mph)
- I-580 (68.26 mph)
- I-5 (66.81 mph)
While California may have many of the cities with the highest average speed for fatal car accidents, it is not one of the states whose residents drive the fastest. California is not on the Auto Insurance Center’s lists of the top 10 states with the highest average driving speed or the top 10 states with most deaths linked to speeding.
One significant if not surprising result from the Auto Insurance Center’s lists is that younger drivers tend to drive the fastest. The average speed for drivers involved in fatal car accidents ranges from 54 mph (at 22 years old) to 26 mph (at 87 years old).
Speeding and Accidents
While fatal car accidents can occur no matter how quickly a driver is going, excessive speed does make a fatal accident – or any accident – more likely. A person’s reaction time is not instantaneous, and a moving vehicle takes time to stop. When a driver is speeding, he or she has less time to react and less time to stop, and it takes longer for the car to reach a standstill.
Studies have proven that it takes roughly 1.75 seconds for the brain to process information that the eyes relay. This means that nearly two seconds pass between when a driver sees something happen and when he or she can understand and react to it.
In that 1.75-second interval, a car traveling 55 mph will cover a distance of 142 feet. Once the driver perceives danger, he or she will experience another slight delay in reaction time while deciding what to do. In that time, the car travels another 61 feet. If the driver decides to apply the brakes, a car traveling 55 mph will travel an average distance of 216 feet before stopping. All of these delays mean that a car will travel 419 feet from the time a danger appears on the road to when it stops.
The amount of impact force that a car going at a high speed generates is also far greater than one traveling more slowly, causing more damage to people and objects involved in the crash. A vehicle traveling at 60 mph will have an impact force nine times higher than one going 20 mph.
Faster vehicles are also more difficult to control. Taking a curve too quickly can cause a vehicle to enter a dangerous skid. Excessive speed also makes hydroplaning more likely.
All drivers must be aware of the dangers posed by driving their vehicles faster than the posted limits. Drivers in the 11 California cities with high average speeds involved in fatal accidents must take special care to obey the law and drive safely.
If you’re loved one died in a fatal car crash, call our San Diego wrongful death attorneys for a free case evaluation into your options.