They can tell me all kinds of statistics about how many more people get killed in car accidents than get killed in airplane crashes, but it won't impress me nearly as much as it will today, as I watch TV coverage of the bridge collapse on W-35 in Minneapolis. Boom-- suddenly a road full of motorists in a bumper to bumper standstill dropped summarily into the Mississippi River.
That bridge is within blocks of a house that belonged to one of my in-laws long ago, and my little family and I crossed it many times when it was fairly new. I was told then that "you used to be able to see where Shingle Creek went through before they put in the highway." Today you probably can see Shingle Creek again if you can get anywhere near the scene. People died in their cars, in the water.
Yet I pop into the car, as I will this morning, and go to the supermarket along with a lot of other folks and think nothing of it. My husband will say "be careful" as he always does and I will promise to. I am careful in the car-- a 100% of the time seat belt user, a person who stops on yellow, and who stays well behind the car ahead, and keeps well within the speed limit. My own driving record is really quite good, and I am not nervous on the road (as long as I am driving.)
My grown grandson and his dad will be motorcycling for a week or two around the northwest this summer-- a tour on their sensible bikes over mountain passes and long stretches of desert roads. I really get the creeps about motorcycles, though I know that those two are careful. What's scary is that the other car drivers may not see them. I know I find it nettlesome to keep track of the motorcycles on the highway when I drive, and I say things under my breath to those riders who duck so agilely through the line of cars. I really work at knowing where they are, but not everyone does.
I will throw in some statistics here, for reference. (this is only about deaths-- it doesn't count injuries).
Even though I know that statistics are easy to misinterpret to prove a point, I cannot help but come to the conclusion that when I drive my car to go shopping I will be doing something exponentially more dangerous than marching off to the war in Iraq!
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said 42,642 people were killed in highway crashes last year [2006], a drop from the 43,510 in 2005. (from Fox News )
There were 698 fatal accidents in 22,800,000 total flight hours in 2006 (from U.S. General Aviation)
4,810 motorcycle deaths in 2006 now exceed pedestrian deaths at 4,784. (From Web Bike World.)
(For a slightly different slant on this, here's a sort of statistic of about a three-year period -- so you could split it loosely into 1000+ per year): The Pentagon reported that 3,647 American service members and civilian workers for the Defense Department have died since the start of the Iraq war in March 2003. (from NYTimes July 31, 2007)
It's certainly not going to hurt anything for a Mom to wrap her dear ones in a special sort of "bubble wrap" when they travel.
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