Car crashes kill someone almost every two hours in Texas and injure someone every two and a half minutes according to data from the Texas Department of Transportation.
Laura Scott of Copperas Cove lost her son to a car crash several years ago.
She says 12-year-old Tyler was killed in 2003 when a drunk driver smashed into their family vehicle.
Laura said, “I always say a car is a gun, it’s a weapon and the ammunition is your key as soon as you put your key in that ignition you have just loaded your weapon.”
Officials are trying to put an end to this alarming trend.
Cathy Chase, President of Advocates for Highway & Auto Safety said, “We are now at a critical point in our nation's surface transportation history, motor vehicles accidents are skyrocketing despite fewer miles being driven.”
Jacob Smith, PIO with TxDOT said the main cause for such accidents is, “drunk driving, speeding, driver inattention just to name a few.”
The Texas Department of Transportation also shared the fatality rate on Texas roadways for 2020 was 1.5 deaths per hundred million vehicle miles traveled.
This is an 18.94 percent increase from 1.26 in 2019. Data from 2021 has not yet been shared.
