Highway fatalities in Kentucky increased in 2020, officials say.
According to a preliminary report from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet Office of Highway Safety, highway deaths rose from 732 in 2019 to 778 in 2020, a 5% increase.
Of those deaths, 57.1% were not wearing a seat belt, which KYTC Secretary Jim Gray says is an increase of 6% over the previous year.
“While numbers are important to identify potential issues and areas of concern, highway safety is not all about numbers – it’s about people,” Gray says in a press release. “These are fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers who left loved ones behind. These lives could have possibly been saved with the simple snap of a seat belt.”
Alcohol played a role in 15.7% of the 778 deaths on Kentucky’s highways, the report says. Additionally, 32% involved speeding or aggressive driving, and 19% involved driver distraction.
Pedestrians and bicyclists accounted for 97 deaths, and motorcyclists accounted for 74 deaths.
“2020 was a year of devastating loss for Kentuckians, but what makes deaths even harder to accept is when they could have been prevented,” Gov. Andy Beshear says in a release. “These figures are unacceptable to us and they should be unacceptable to every driver — every person — in our state. We all have to be more vigilant about personal safety and responsibility behind the wheel if we are going to reverse this trend.”
A final report is expected in April.
The number of highway fatalities in Kentucky has yo-yoed over the last 20 years, with a high of 985 deaths in 2005. The state saw a low of 638 highway fatalities in 2013.
This article appears in Best Of Cincinnati 2021.
