January 9th: Hi all you wonderful people. We’re back again after a great break and we wish everyone a successful 2017. We’ll be kicking off the year tomorrow by attending the release of the 2016/17 festive season road crash and fatality figures by Transport Minister Dipuo Peters. Expect bad news.
The last we heard was 844 deaths between December 1st and December 16th 2016 representing a 17 percent increase over the previous year’s ‘body count’ for the same period. From what we have observed and heard from EMS people on the ground, it has been an horrendous period of death and mayhem on the roads. In just one crash last Saturday, 16 people were killed when a bakkie and taxi collided on the N1 near Hammanskraal – see pictures below.
There have been many other crashes and many other deaths. I weep for this country when it comes to our road safety record. More so though, I weep for the hundreds of families who have lost their loved ones in this senseless carnage.
January 10th: Minister of Transport’s report on festive Season road crash and fatalies report.
Minister of Transport reports that a total of 1714 fatalities were recorded over this festive season – a 5% increase on the previous period. KZN, Gauteng, Eastern Cape and Limpopo accounted for 61% of the total number of people who died on the roads in this period.
