Car accident deaths on the rise

BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) - This holiday season more people will be hitting the roads in Louisiana. State troopers are working on making sure people drive safe, as the number of fatal crashes rises.

“Inherently during the holiday season, Thanksgiving and Christmas we have an increased focus on the impaired driving aspect because a lot of people like to go out and party for the holidays and then get behind the wheel impaired,” Trooper Taylor Scrantz said.

Scrantz said a combination of factors leads to more fatal crashes.

“We see fatality crashes in both urban and rural parishes, and it’s the same combination of things, lack of seatbelt use, impaired driving, and speed, distractions in combination with those three things are a recipe for disaster,” Scrantz said.

One driver in Baton Rouge said distracted driving is the biggest traffic problem he sees.

“People are texting, honestly mainly texting, and they’re always on their computers, their phones, they just don’t pay attention and I think it affects every age group too,” Wallace Taylor said.

He adds it can happen anywhere.

“My next-door neighbor, her mother was killed in Iowa two years ago by a girl who was 18, she was texting, a brand new highway, only two cars on the whole highway, and she ran head-on into my friend’s mother and killed her,” Taylor said.

State troopers said this Thanksgiving and Christmas, have a plan to get home safely if you’re going to be drinking, and put the phone down when you’re traveling.

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