The majority of car accidents do not even result in injury, but all accidents have the potential to lead to serious injuries or death. In the United States alone, more than 35,000 people tend to pass away in these accidents every single year, and there are many more accidents that cause severe injuries.
What this means is that you need to consider this risk every time that you drive. Any trip, no matter how short, has the potential to result in a very serious accident. You’re not in control of this, as all it takes is another driver to make a critical error.
What makes a car accident more likely to be fatal?
If you’ve ever wondered what increases the odds that a car accident will lead to a fatality, there are a lot of different factors to consider. Some of the major ones include the following:
- Speed: Speed increases the severity of injuries. There is more energy in the crash and that means that the injuries may be greater than they would have been at a lower speed, even if all the other factors were the same.
- Vehicle size difference: There’s some evidence that the size of vehicles can determine the likelihood of a fatal accident. Notably, when a very large vehicle, such as an 18-wheeler, crashes into a smaller passenger car, those in the passenger car have very high odds of suffering fatal injuries.
- Alcohol use: Alcohol use not only causes accidents, but it also reduces reaction times. This means that even a driver who tries to avoid a crash may not hit the brakes in time, for instance, meaning that they’ll be going faster at the moment of impact. As seen above, this means that the odds of a fatality are higher.
If you have been involved in a car accident and you’ve lost a loved one, you must know how to seek proper financial compensation for your losses.