Pat on the back for US bus safety
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AMERICAN road passenger transport operators were complimented for their achievement in reducing accidents and casualties involving buses in 1974, the latest year for which figures are available.
Speaking at the 46th annual meeting of the National Association of Motor Bus Owners in Arizona last week, Dr Robert A. Kaye, Director of the Bureau of Motor Carrier Safety, said : "In the face of tremendous increases in motor vehicle and driver registrations as well as increasing miles of travel by all vehicles sharing the highway, the intercity bus industry has added further lustre to its safety image."
The preliminary 1974 figures showed that fatalities on intercity operations had continued their gradual but steady decline of the past 10 years, while injuries per million vehicle miles on intercity passenger operation had decreased to the lowest level ever recorded. Of accidents involving passenger carriers, only 10 per cent in 1974 were single-vehicle accidents, a significant improvement over the 28 per cent figure for 1972. In 62 per cent of the collisions in 1973/4, cars were involved and in many the cars and their drivers were contributing factors.
In 1973, some 785 intercity bus accidents had resulted in 105 fatalities, 2,480 injuries and $3.0m property damage. In 1974, some 703 accidents resulted in 77 fatalities, 2,138 injuries and *2.9m property damage.
In 1972 the fatality rate based on vehicle mileage was 9.20 per hundred million vehicle miles ; this rose to 11.55 in 1973—partly through one or two particularly severe accidents—but dropped even more dramatically in 1974 to 7.82.