Alarming Rate of Fatal Road Accidents in Malaysia

Introduction

Fatal road accident can be defined as a death resulting from an unfortunate mishap happened on a public road involving one or more vehicle. According to Tang (2017), Malaysia has the highest road fatality risk among the ASEAN and made it to the top three countries in the world of the list of fatal road accident with a death rate of 23 per 100,000 population. By means of this, about 7000 to 8000 people in Malaysia died due to road accidents annually, based on the statistic against the estimated population of 30 million Malaysians. The resolution of this essay is to note down the leading causes of death on Malaysian roads and ways to avert the causes. First and foremost, distracted driving stated as the leading cause of accidents according to Rivera (2018), followed by reckless drivers, automobile defects and drunk driving. Hence, ways to avert the causes stated above are by reducing in-car distractions, be courteous to other drivers, performing engine maintenance regularly and do not drink and drive.

Causes and Solutions of Fatal Road Accidents

Causes of Fatal Road Accidents

Any activity that takes the attention from the task of safe driving away, including eating and drinking, talking and texting on the phone and fiddling with car’s radio are distracted driving. In addition, the most alarming distraction is paying attention to the phone. Five second is all it takes to send or read a text and that is like driving the length of an entire football field at 55mph with the eyes closed. (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 2011). Within only that five seconds, anything unwanted can happen and lead to an accident, or even worse, death.

Furthermore, reckless driving can also create a fatal accident. According to Akhbari (2018), reckless driving is an action the driver did that shows an utter disregard for the safety of the property and persons. In other words, they choose to drive dangerously despite knowing the risk. Tailgating, exceeding the speed limit and not using turns signals when changing lanes or turning are the example of reckless driving that always be done. These are typically caused by one or more poor decisions made by the drivers. All these poor decisions made will not just harm a life, but even more than that.

The third cause of fatal accident is automobile defects. Automobile (n.d) is defined as a usually four-wheeled land transportation that powered by internal engines, such as a car. Defect (n.d) is deficiency, or lack of something necessary for completeness that causes inadequacy of failure. Thus, automobile defect can be explained as any deficiency in a car that lead to damage or injury to a person. Some examples of safety-related defects listed by (NHTSA, 2011) include wheels that crack or break and a damage steering components can cause loss of vehicle control. Plus, the malfunction of the brake systems and the air bags that deploy when they should not may lead to a worse scenario. Last but not least, drunk driving apparently become one of the main causes of fatal road accidents in Malaysia. A total of 1,035 road accidents were recorded due to the alcohol consumption by drivers which resulted in 618 deaths between 2010 and April 2015. (Carvalho, 2015). In many drunk driving accidents, drivers usually being drift off the road or into other lanes of oncoming traffic. It is not wrong to drink alcohol since that is an individual’s preference yet, driving under the influence of alcohol that may lead to an unwanted accidents is totally a different case.

Solutions of Fatal Road Accidents

Consequently, ways to prevent distracted driving is by putting away or silenced the cell phone. This will prevent the temptation to check the phone every time you hear the notification sound, stated by Hoffman (2017). Next, the driver should also reduce in-car distractions such as fiddling the car’s radio, eating and driving. It is important to stay focus and concentrate on the drive in order to save many lives. Everything unnecessary can wait yet, your life will never be refundable. (Fielding, 2016) Secondly, reckless driving can be avoided by proper awareness, said Aisha Al Janahi, an Emirati senior social media specialist in Dubai. This problem can be solved by teaching indirectly by using reverse psychology as the people do not want to take the advice directly. For instance, awareness videos of the consequences of reckless driving that can move the heart can be done. It should also be a trend, and hashtag that catches the attention of web users need to be created. (Khan, 2016) Sometimes, Laiza King (2017) stated accidents are caused by automobile defects and it cannot be avoid. Thus, precaution steps that can be done are by making sure to take note of any recalls in the news and take your car in for regular maintenance. Besides, as stated by Quint (2016), the oil needed to be changed regularly to keep the engine cool and lubricated, and never let the gas fall below a quarter tank since it can cause the electric fuel-pump motor to suck in air and wear out prematurely. Lastly, according to Lee DeHaan (2017), ways to prevent fatal accidents caused by drunk driving are by downloading Uber, look up taxi services or assign a designated driver. Before a night of drinking, an Uber account need to be set up and some local taxi services need to be looked up and their phone numbers need to be saved. If you feel they are somewhat burdensome, someone trustworthy and responsible in your group of friends can be appointed to be the designated driver. Most importantly, never drink and drive, for your own and others’ sake.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, the statistic of fatal accidents in Malaysia itself is worrisome and needed to be prevented effectively. The causes of fatal accidents are distracted driving, reckless driving, automobile defects and drunk driving. Hence, some ways to avert them are by reducing in-car distractions, create awareness, doing car maintenance regularly and never drink and drive. By doing so, fatal road accidents can be reduced and make Malaysian roads safer.