Traffic accidents killed some 68,000 people and injured 302,000
across China in the first eight months of this year, according to
the Ministry of Public Security.
A total of 340,000 traffic accidents occurred from January to
August, a year-on-year rise of 24.0 percent, with the number of
fatalities increasing 2.7 percent in the same period.
Economic losses from traffic accidents dropped 34 percent in the
period, to 1.7 billion yuan (US$203.0 million).
Traffic safety in August -- three months after the new Road
Traffic Safety Law went into effect -- was particularly dismal.
Around 43,000 accidents occurred in August, causing 9,601
deaths, 45,860 injuries and economic losses of 18.0 million yuan
(US$2.2 million).
A traffic official from the ministry said that speeding, drunk
driving, illegal passing and reckless driving were the major causes
of accidents.
In August alone, speeding caused 48 major accidents, in each of
which three or more people were killed, leaving 176 dead and 172
injured. The total number killed by excessively fast driving was
1,726.
Motor vehicles, especially trucks, are at fault in 94 percent of
traffic accidents. In August, trucks caused 87 major accidents in
which 340 people were killed.
In one case on June 16, 21 of 26 passengers on a bus were killed
in an accident in Xinyu, a city in southeast China's Jiangxi
Province. The bus was only designed to accommodate 19 people.
Driver Li Xinming lost control of the vehicle and it went off the
road into a lake. He was sentenced to five years in prison.
(China Daily September 15, 2004)