First Posted: 1/30/2015
LIMA — Last year proved to have a slight increase of fatal vehicle accidents, according to the Lima Allen County Regional Planning Commission.
In a presentation of the draft report of the 2014 fatal crash report to local law enforcement and the public, the commission and the Allen County coroner presented the data of the nine fatal crashes. Nine people died.
Of the nine crashes, three occurred in the city of Lima and six occurred on rural roadways. Three crashes occurred in Marion Township and one crash took place in each Perry, Shawnee and Jackson townships.
Drug or alcohol played a role in three of the crashes, and one was speed related.
Five vehicle occupants died after not using seatbelts, although the restraints were available. One motorcyclist died while not wearing a helmet.
“We hate to bring bad news to the community, but in turn, we’re able to let the community know what’s happening in our Allen County and how we can try to prevent further problems with our fatalities,” Coroner Dr. Gary Beasley said.
Largely, vehicle-related fatalities involve collisions with other cars, people on bicycles and pedestrians.
Beasley said roughly 55 percent of the crashes occurred on clear driving conditions on dry pavement.
“We were fortunate this year that none of those occurred during the holiday season which was really fantastic, but still, nine deaths is too many,” Beasley said.
In 2013, there were seven fatal crashes and there are two fatal crashes thus far in 2015, Beasley said.
To help prevent fatalities during the Super Bowl weekend, the coroner urged the use of designated drivers.
The Allen County Sheriff’s Office will also increase patrol for the Super Bowl weekend, Lt. Brian Winegardner with the ACSO said. Typically, the ACSO has six patrolmen on the streets, but the sheriff’s office will increase their patrol by three or four patrolmen this weekend.
Winegardner said the amount of crashes historically increases during Super Bowl weekend.
To give comments, visit www.lacrpc.com scroll down to and click on “What’s New”; then scroll down to the 2014 Fatal Crash Summary Report. To leave a comment, click on the “Comments?” tab at the top of the page.
