2000/2001 Holiday road toll at 17

The 2000/2001 holiday road toll period has ended with a provisional figure of 17 deaths, equal to the number of deaths for the same time last year.

The tally is an improvement on the 1997/1998 and 1998/1999 holiday road tolls which were 26 and 24 respectively.

The lowest holiday road toll since 1980 is 13 which occurred in the 1984/85 holiday period.

Fourteen of the 17 deaths occurred in open road crashes and nine deaths were in crashes involving a head on collision. Five deaths were in single vehicle crashes in which the driver lost control of the vehicle.

Seven fatalities were passengers, seven were drivers, one was a motorcyclist, one a cyclist and one a pedestrian.

Two deaths could have been avoided had these people been wearing their seatbelts.

“December was the second worst month in 2000 with 48 deaths. We don’t want to see a repeat of that and we’d like to think we can improve on the 2000 road toll which at 462 is the lowest in 36 years,’’ Land Transport Safety Director Reg Barrett said.

The official holiday period began at 1600 on Friday 22 December and ended at 0600 3 January 2001.

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