Building the European Road Safety Observatory. SafetyNet. Deliverable 5.7 Fatal accident database development and analysis - final report

Task 5.1 of SafetyNet Work Package 5 is concerned with the development of a broad ranging, intermediate level Fatal Accident database. The information provided in the database represents a major advance in the knowledge of the nature and circumstances of fatal accidents within the EU. The information could be used as the basis for the development of countermeasures for fatal accidents within the EU - the data have been systematically collected according to defined sampling plans in participating Member States and hence the data are broadly representative of these Member States. In the main, the data were derived from strictly factual police reports of fatal accident investigations although in certain cases, alternative sources of information were used including insurance investigation reports. The data recorded described the highway, vehicle and road-user factors to provide a description of the whole crash. The level of detail recorded was considerably greater than is currently obtainable in the CARE or CAREPLUS 2 specification. Approximately 100 – 150 variables with 500+ items of data were typically gathered for each accident investigated. Specific areas of data described the overall accident circumstances, driver and vehicle characteristics, specific road infrastructure features and descriptions of other crash participants. A pilot and review activity took place before the main data collection phase commenced. During the main phase, the data were gathered and recorded onto a database which was specifically developed for WP5. The main data collection period involved collection of a representative sample of between 2% and 10% of the fatal crashes in each country (depending on the magnitude of the fatal accident population). In the end, 1298 fatal accident cases, involving at least 1 fatality per accident case were entered onto the database and subsequently analysed.