Breakneck Speed: The Main Reason for Traffic Accidents (PART 1) [Archives:2001/36/Reportage]

Yasser Mohammed Ahmad
Yemen Times
We hear a lot about deadly traffic accidents claiming the lives of hundreds of people every year. The causes of these accidents range from high speed, violating traffic rules to reckless driving.
Highways have always been the scene of hundreds of traffic accidents, hence thousands of people are killed owing to overspeed and reckless driving. Thus, we find it necessary to conduct this investigation with the view of identifying the reasons behind this high number of accidents.
International Health Organization’s statistics unveil that about 700000 persons are killed around the world each year in traffic accidents. In other word, 50 persons each minute. Similarly, the statistics show that 2 million people are injured in traffic accidents each year. So aren’t these figures enough to make of this issue a top concern.
In a bid to have a clear idea about the problem we discussed the problem from different perspectives:
Abdulhakim Ali Bassir Sana’a-Taiz road watchman, said that ” the causes of traffic accidents are so many. However, highways such as the Sana’a-Taiz road has been the scene of hundreds of fatal accidents due to its narrowness and overcrowds. Moreover, the non-observance of traffic rules adds insult to injury hence a large number of accidents are caused by reckless driving. We call upon the government to promulgate laws for regulating driving in a way that ensures a safe road and safeguard the lives of the people. Some people accuse taxi-drivers of being the principal cause of accidents, but in my opinion other reasons are behind the large number of traffic accidents such as the unavailability of traffic signs, narrow roads and some times bad weather conditions.
Ali Omar Taxi-driver Sana’a-Taiz road, said that “most the accidents occur during night by small and big vehicles which have no back lights. Moreover, gas tankers driving at fast speed cause lots of accidents.
Mohammed Ali Rajeh driver, said that ” most accidents occur because of overcrowded traffic movement and bad weather conditions. Pick-up cars (Hilux) driving at breakneck speed is just another headache since these cars come suddenly from the road side and cause violent crashes with the other cars on the roads
Abduhassen al-Khyat Sana’a-Aden road driver, said that ” most traffic accidents are caused by pick-up cars drivers which are mainly used for transporting agricultural products to the main cities. Furthermore, the fall of large stones from the road sides is just another factor since retaining walls beside the roads are entirely nonexistent. During the rainy seasons the number of accidents increase in a scary way and this necessities exercising more and more caution in such conditions.
Ali as-Shameri driver, has a different opinion as he said that ” Yemen imports second-hand vehicles from different countries although the Yemeni cities and high ways have not enough space to contain all these cars.

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