MOTOR FATALITIES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 40013, 22 October 1929, Page 3

MOTOR FATALITIES.

AND OTHER ACCIDENTS

THE DOMINION’S RECORD

The number of deaths recorded from all accidental causes in 1928 was 744, corresponding to a rate of 5.35 per 10,009 inhabitants, says the annual repoirt dealing with the Dominion’s vital statistics. This compares with 656 and 4.77 for the previous year. Most unsatisfactory is the fact that death from motor-vehicle accidents record an appreciable increase. The number of deaths attributable to suich accidents dulling 1924, 1925, 1926, 1927, and 1928 are 94, 108, 149, 138, and 176 respectively. These figures arc exclusive of such accidents where persons have been killed in collisions between motorvehicles and trains or trams. For 1928 there were 12 deaths from such accidents, bringing the total numiber of eases in whcili death occurred where a motor-vehicle was an agent up to_l_Bß. The corresponding figure for 1927 was 152.

The death rate from motor-ve-hicle accidents is not appreciably higher in the urban areas than in the country districts. The rate per 40,000 of population for the whole of the Dominion in 1928 was 1.27, for the urban areas 1.35, and for the country or remaining districts 1.17. It. is interesting to observe the difference in the rates for the four main centres. Wellington records the highest with a rate of 1.54, followed by Auckland with 1.26, Christchurch with 1.06, and Dunedin with 0.48. It will he nothat, with the exception of Wellington, all have a rate lower than the general rate for the entire Dominion. Accidents arising from the use of horse-drawn vehicles ■claimed 17 deaths. Comparatively few fatal tramway accidents occur in New Zealand, this class of vehicle claiming only 10 deaths in 1928. No fewer than 144 persons were accidentally drowned during the year (129 males and 15 females). Falls resulted fatally in 96 eases, and burns and scalds in 33 cases. ‘Twenty-three deaths wore attributable to traumatism by firearms, 16 to traumatism in mines and quarries, while 19 persons perished through the outbreak of fires. In 15 cases the cause of death was returned as fracture of skull or other hones, without the cause of sueh fracture being indicated.

In view of the widespread international interest in statistics of accidental deaths resulting from the various classes of vehicles, detailed patierulars of these fatal accidents are given. To avoid confusion in classification circumstances where two different classes of vehicle were involved in the death the accident has been ascribed to the heavier or less mobile vehicle. Thus in a case of death resulting from a collision between a railway train and a motor-car, the cause ■of death would be assigned as “traumatism by railways.” On this basis railway accidents in 1928 were responsible for 44 deaths. Ten of these were caused through level-crossing accidents, when mo-tor-vehicles and trains collided; six were shunting fatalities, and twenty-three were “other and undefined” railway accidents. Mo-tor-vehicle accidents (the overturning and collision of cars, and such like mishaps), accounted for 176 deaths during the year. Twen-ty-four people were killed by cars running over banks, but only one pillion rider met with a sudden end.

The Dominion’s trams caused only ten deaths during 1 the year, four of these fatalities being due to falls from trams.