Accident cases on the decline ?
A Micro Level Traffic Study Planning Programme conducted by the Coimbatore City Police and the Golden Hour Trauma Care networking of private hospital ambulances has resulted in fatal accident cases coming down by 4 per cent, said City Police Commissioner K.C. Mahali on Friday.Making a presentation on the one-year performance of the traffic planning and the golden hour trauma care, Mr. Mahali said since May 2007 to April 2008, a total of 308 persons had died. This period is treated as non-plan period. The same period during 2008-2009 had registered 297 fatal accident cases. Similarly, the accident rate in respect of non-fatal cases such as rash and negligent driving (Section 279), causing hurt or endangering life and personal safety of others (Section 337) and causing grievous injury (Section 338) of Indian Penal Code (IPC) had also come down. These cases registered during the period from May 2007 to April 2008 was 1,271 whereas the same had come down to 914 cases, thus, registering an over all decline of 28 per cent.The meeting was attended by Deputy Commissioners of Police K. Shanmugavel (Law and Order), N. Kamini (Crime and traffic) and P. Nagarajan (Headquarters).
The meeting discussed the road accident statistics relating to the first four months of 2009 and also the statistics relating to May 2007 to April 2008 (non-plan period) and May 2008 to April 2009 (plan period). During the first four months of 2009, the city had witnessed 101 cases of fatal accidents. In January, 21 men and two women were killed, while it was 17 men and five women in February, and 33 men and eight women in March.In April, the number of fatal accidents was 15. Most of the fatal accident cases were reported after 9 p.m., followed by accidents during peak hours from 9 a.m. to 12 noon and from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m.
In fatal accident cases, motorcycles occupied the first position, followed by TNSTC buses and cars were the third cause for loss of lives during the first four month. Among those killed, motorcycles and pillion riders constituted 44 per cent, 32 per cent pedestrians, drivers/passengers and others constituted 16 per cent and cyclists 8 per cent.
In the last four months, Corporation roads registered 39 fatal accidents, followed by Avanashi Road and Sathyamangalam Road accounting for 14 accidents each.In the non-fatal category, 49 per cent were motorcycle and pillion riders, 35 per cent pedestrians, 12 per cent drivers/others followed by 4 per cent cyclists. A total of 296 persons sustained injuries due to accidents in the last four months. During the first four months of 2008, the total lives lost were 117 and during the planned period the same was brought down to 101.
