Car accidents occur year-round in Texas. Unlike Northern states that experience heavily rainy springs and huge snowfalls in the winter, Texas is relatively consistent throughout the year. Despite this, there are still a few parts of the year with spikes and drops in the number of car accidents. Alongside this, there are certain months that see differences in rates of fatal car accidents, as opposed to accidents with mere injury.
If you’ve been in a car accident in Texas, it is important to talk to an attorney about your case. You might be entitled to compensation for your injuries, lost wages, and pain and suffering, and the Dallas personal injury attorneys at The Queenan Law Firm may be able to help you with your case.
Texas Car Accident Statistics
All of the statistics in this article come from the National Highway Transportation Safety Association’s (NHTSA’s) FARS system. FARS (Fatality Analysis Reporting System) compiles information from crashes throughout the country and assembles it into a usable form. Because this is a huge trove of data, the most recent numbers available on FARS as of writing this article are from 2015. These numbers might be a bit outdated at this point, but still give a good image of how road dangers change throughout the year.
The two months with the highest incident of accidents are October with 316 car crashes, and July with 303 car accidents. Even though October had more accidents, July had more fatal crashes, with 254 fatal accidents, compared to October’s 251 fatal accidents.
Unsurprisingly, the two seasons with the highest number of accidents are the seasons containing these months: fall and summer. Fall has the most accidents out of any season in Texas, with 825 accidents and 647 fatal crashes. Summer had the most fatal crashes out of any season, with 654 fatal crashes, but the second most crashes with 786 crashes in 2015.
Overall, fall and summer do not really stand out as significantly worse. Spring, summer, and fall varied by range of less than 75 accidents. Winter is really the only standout season, in that it had a whopping 242 less people injured in car accidents than the next closest season; spring had 1,927 people injured in car accidents, and winter only had 1,685.
Overall, it seems that February is the safest month. Across the board, it was the month with the lowest number of people injured (459 people), lowest number of car accident fatalities (195 fatalities), lowest number of fatal crashes (169 crashes), and overall lowest number of car accidents (215 crashes).
Drunk Driving Accident Statistics
FARS also tracks how many accidents had alcohol involved. This is an incredibly important statistic, since drunk driving accidents are one of the largest dangers on the road.
It seems that the warmer months are when drinking and driving increases. May through August appears to be drunk driving season, with these months being the four highest months for alcohol-related crashes. The fifth highest month is unsurprisingly October, since it is one of the most dangerous months, overall.
Spring and summer, accordingly, are the seasons with the highest drunk driving accidents. In summer of 2015, Texas had 234 car crashes involving alcohol, and in spring, it had 216. Compare this to 185 alcohol-related crashes in fall and another 185 crashes in winter. This means that, combined, summer and spring account for 450 of the 820 alcohol-related car accidents in 2015.
In the big picture, even these more dangerous seasons only account for about 51.2% of the year’s crashes. February is still clearly the safest month to be free from drunk driving accidents. If each month represented 1/12 of the total number of accidents, its fair share, it would represent about 8.3% of the year’s accidents. February 2015 covers only 5.6% of the drunk driving accidents for the year – the lowest by far. Compared to June, the highest month, covering around 9.8% of the years drunk driving accidents, February is far safer.
Car Accident Attorneys Available Year-round
Despite these statistics, car accidents are rarely predictable. In the blink of an eye, any time of year, a car accident injury could drastically change your life, or end the life of a loved one. Whether you were harmed in one of the highest accident-prone months, or one of the least, you should be entitled to compensation. Especially if you have lost a loved one to a car accident, you might be entitled to high compensation.
The Midland personal injury lawyers at The Queenan Law Firm help clients get compensation for their injuries. This includes medical bills, lost wages, and even compensation for your pain and suffering. For a free consultation with our attorneys on your car accident injury case, call today at (817) 476-1797.