SALT LAKE CITY – In the midst of the Thanksgiving travel period, a new study has ranked all 50 U.S. states to find those with the highest fatal-crash rates per 100,000 registered drivers.
Thankfully, Utah rated a modest 39 out of 50 in the state ranking that covered federal crash data from 2019 to 2023, with only 60 fatal crashes per capita during that five-year period.
Given the state’s average of 2.2 million drivers, however, that rather dry statistic translates to more than 1,300 fatal crashes between 2019 and 2023.
Nevertheless, local residents can take some solace from the fact that Mississippi’s rate of fatal death crashes is nearly triple that of Utah, with its 160 crashes per capita making the Magnolia State number one in the state-by-state ranking.
That study was conducted by analysts from King Stahlman Bail Bonds in California, using the latest five years of crash data available from the federal National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in Washington, D.C.
Fatal crashes remain one of America’s most persistent and heartbreaking public-safety issues, according to federal officials, claiming tens of thousands of lives every year.
More than 40,000 people die on U.S. roads annually, they say, a figure that has stubbornly refused to drop even as vehicles become safer and driver-assist technology becomes more sophisticated.
Risky behaviors — like speeding, distracted driving and fatigue — continue to play an outsized role in deadly wrecks, while demographic factors such as older and younger drivers also shape state-by-state patterns.
The King Stahlman analysis not only revealed where fatal crashes are most common, but also identified which traffic violations are most frequently linked to those collisions.
Not surprisingly, speeding is the most common violation associated with deadly crashes nationwide and Utah is no exception to that rule. The NHTSA data confirmed that excessive speeding contributed to nearly 30 percent of fatal crashes here in Utah.
But other findings about fatal crashes in Utah are somewhat surprising.
Despite the persistent concern about young drivers being involved in traffic mishaps, the NHTSA statistics reveal that elderly Utah drivers are actually more likely to be involved in fatal crashes.
Drivers 65 years old or older are involved in slightly more than 20 percent of crashes resulting in fatalities here in Utah, compared to drivers aged 15 to 20 being involved in about 16 percent of similar incidents.
Despite all the statewide hubbub about distracted driving – especially sending or receiving phone calls or texts on mobile devices – federal statisticians concluded that only about 5.5 percent of fatal accidents in Utah resulted from distracted driving.
Finally, the King Stahlman researchers found that less than one-half of one percent of fatal crashes in Utah involved drivers who were drowsy at the time of the accident.
With fatal-crash rates ranging from 160 to 112 per 100,000 registered drivers, the states of Mississippi, New Mexico, Wyoming, South Carolina, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Louisiana and Montana made up the top ten states in the King Stahlman study.
Founded more than six decades ago, the King Stahland Bail Bond service is based in the San Diego area and other locations throughout California.