Plea from police to cut out 'driver error' after rise in crashes in North East

Roads inspector Lorraine Mackie has been speaking to Northsound Radio about a recent spike in road traffic accidents on North East roads.

Author: Lewis MichiePublished 2nd Aug 2021

A North East road policing inspector is telling Northsound Radio they've seen a spike in crashes caused by "driver error".

Lorraine Mackie has been telling us that they are concerned with the number of RTC's, with an increasing amount of serious incidents in the last few weeks.

Two people have died, and a teenage boy left with life changing injuries, in crashes in the region in the last week alone.

Officers say they seeing a large amount of incidents caused by drivers using a mobile phone, speeding or drink/drug driving.

North East Roads Inspector Lorraine Mackie said:

"Sadly this year there's been a number of fatalities and serious collisions on North East roads, and whilst investigations remain ongoing for these collisions, what we do see is recurring themes for causation factors in these collisions, and they are concerning.

"There's three that are significant, one is distracted driving - so using a telephone whilst driving. The second one is impairment through drink or drugs. The third is drivers not giving themselves enough time to react.

"For example speeding, or inappropriate speed for the weather or the road conditions."

Officers are patrolling a network of roads throughout the region every day, in an effort to prevent accidents, and are purposely very visible on many routes.

Mackie tells us that often Summer months can prove challenging to deal with drivers making errors, she said:

"I think in the Summer months, particularly during holiday time, this year there's a lot of people 'stay-cationing' there's a lot of people on the roads that are not from this area.

"When it's dry and the roads are not wet, perhaps they are driving faster than they normally would."

Officers are advising motorists not to let their guard down and think they won't be involved in an accident.

They also want drivers to be aware that on many of the routes around the area, there could be a higher volume of slow moving vehicles like tractors, caravans and lorries, meaning those behind the wheel should be prepared to react.

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