|
Paper Title:
Dead Tired: Fatigue related
crashes on National Route 39
View
full paper
Authors:
Robyn G Attwell, Susannah
Lock, Kim Dobbie, Michelle Walker
Abstract:
Fatigue represents a
significant social and economic cost to the community, as it is
one of the primary contributing factors of road crashes. Fatigue
related crashes are often more severe than other crashes as fatigued
drivers' reaction times are delayed or the driver has not employed
an avoidance manoeuvre to avoid the collision. However the examination
of fatigue crashes is often problematic as there is no universal
definition of fatigue and it is difficult to objectively measure
the degree of driver fatigue following a crash. Therefore the ATSB
has constructed an operational definition of a fatigue related crash.
The definition is based on a set of well research selection criterion
and uses crash characteristics routinely collected by different
traffic authorities. The objective of this study is to test the
ATSB operational definition of fatigue and to monitor the trends
of fatigue related crashes on National Route 39, which is a major
transport corridor between Brisbane and Melbourne. This study found
that, using the ATSB definition, 13% of crashes that occurred on
National Route 39 between 1995 and 1999 were classified as fatigue
related. Thirty-three percent of fatal crashes were fatigue related
and 12% of non-fatal crashes were fatigue related. There was a small
increase in the number of fatigue related crashes from 12% in 1995
to 14% in 1999. The study suggests that the ATSB definition is both
practical and possesses face validity. Therefore the ATSB operational
definition could be used to study and monitor fatigue related crashes
in other contexts or on other specific routes.
View
full paper
Back
to Program
|
