5 Factors That Make Auto Collisions Much More Severe

Doing your best to avoid these factors can go a long way in preventing serious automobile accidents.

There are a few common themes that run through most severe collisions. What this means is that, as a driver in the community, you can understand those typical issues and use that knowledge to avoid getting into those types of accidents. Here are five factors that make collisions much more severe.

Speed

The chances are that you’ve never heard of a parking lot car accident that ended in a fatality. This is because collisions at low speeds rarely cause severe injuries. While people often damage each other’s property or have relatively benign health complications, the velocity of each vehicle isn’t sufficient to do serious harm. That, of course, changes when speeds are higher. The reason is that the energy that passes from vehicle to vehicle increases exponentially with pace, and when it gets very high, people get severely hurt.

Distraction

To explain this factor, let’s go through a typical situation. You’re driving the roads of St. Louis at a reasonable speed, then, the car in front of you suddenly stops. Because you’re paying attention, you also hit your brakes and come out of the situation unscathed. Now, imagine you had been texting, fiddling with the radio, or eating. In that case, your reaction time would slow, your speed would be high, and you’d be much more likely to do severe damage when rear-ending the person in front of you.

Intoxication

Alcohol and other mind-altering substances lead to reckless behavior, decreased reaction time, and compromised motor skills. On the roads, these deficiencies can lead to people driving on the wrong side of the road, running red lights, and engaging in a variety of other unsafe activities.

Fatigue

Just like alcohol, fatigue generally leads to a multitude of adverse outcomes. People in this state tend to fall asleep at the wheel and drive poorly, which leads to high-speed accidents. As we explained previously, more velocity means more danger for the drivers involved.

Size Differential

The last factor is one you have less control over. It is the size differential between the two vehicles involved. As you might imagine, a semi-truck hitting you is much different than a midsize car. Simply put, the biggest vehicles on the road are also the most dangerous, as their weight makes them significantly more dangerous.

What you can take away from this article is that you should do your best to avoid the hazards we laid out. For speed, you can travel at a slower pace. For distractions, you can pledge to stay off of your phone and not let anything else take your attention away from the road. Similar lifestyle adjustments can be made for most of the other issues on this list too. Once you start to practice them, you’ll lessen your chances of getting into a severe crash.