It’s that time again. The leaves are turning bright autumn colors, and lovesick deer on the road to romance are finding it crowded with motor vehicles. There are more deer and cars in the U.S. than ever before, so the situation isn’t as amusing as it might initially seem. Deer cause car crashes that kill about 200 people in the US each year, twice as many as Hurricane Sandy. State Farm Insurance says deer collided with 1.23 million vehicles between July 2011 and June 2012, 7.7 percent more than last year. The company’s claims from deer collisions rose almost 8 percent while those for other collisions fell 8.5 percent.
You can thank Global Warming for last year’s the mild winter, which means more deer. Of course, most deer collisions happen in places where people tend to discount climate change. In West Virginia, a driver’s chances of bashing Bambi are 1 in 40, so the state is starting the hunting season a week early to help clear the roads. Virginia ranks 10th in deer-car crashes, and odds are 1 in 103. To see where your state ranks, look here.
________________
Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-eNf
Image (“Vehicular Venison Sausage, after Disney”) by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com
Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length
Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine
Tags: accidents, automobiles, cars, collisions, deer, deer season, deer-vehicle collisions, environment, insurance, motor vehicles
NotionsCapital 
Leave a Reply