10 dangerous New Year days end with 436 fatalities in road accidents

The so-called "10 dangerous New Year days" for monitoring road accidents concluded on Sunday, with a total of 2,467 recorded accidents, resulting in 436 fatalities and 2,376 injuries.

The Road Safety Centre held a meeting on Monday to review the 10-day road accident monitoring period, which ran from December 27 to January 5. While the number of accidents and injuries decreased compared to last year's monitoring period, the number of fatalities was higher.

In previous years, the Road Safety Centre typically monitored road accidents for seven days. However, this year the monitoring period was extended to 10 days, anticipating that many Bangkok residents might take additional leave on January 2 and 3 after the official New Year holidays ended on Wednesday, January 1.

Saharat Wongsakulwiwat, Deputy Director-General of the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation, reported during a press conference that Bangkok recorded the highest number of fatalities at 26, despite the city’s streets being mostly empty during the long New Year holidays.

He noted that Trad, Yala, and Samut Songkhram were the only three provinces with no fatalities from road accidents during the period. Meanwhile, Surat Thani saw the highest number of accidents, with 89 incidents and 100 injuries.

On the final day of the monitoring period, Sunday, there were 139 road accidents, resulting in 29 deaths and 129 injuries.
The primary causes of accidents during the monitoring period were identified as speeding (34.53%), abrupt lane changes (24.46%), and poor visibility (20.86%).

Deputy Interior Minister Songsak Thongsri, who chaired the debriefing meeting, emphasized the need for strict traffic law enforcement throughout the year to reduce road injuries and fatalities. He urged authorities to focus particularly on ensuring compliance among teenagers, the elderly, and foreign drivers to prevent future accidents.