TOTALLY GEEKED!

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Road rage is getting uglier, angrier and a lot more deadly

By Christopher Ingraham February 18

In Nevada, a man recently tracked down a woman involved in a highway rage incident and shot her at her home. Road rage, alas, appears to be causing more and more deaths.

The number of fatal accidents involving enraged drivers has increased nearly tenfold since 2004, according to data compiled by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In 2004, police officers indicated road rage or aggression on the part of the driver as a contributing factor in 26 fatal crashes on the nation's highways. In 2013, 247 fatal accidents met this criteria.

As a barometer of highway rage these numbers are a drastic undercount: they include only fatal accidents, not non-fatal ones. (Cases like the one in Nevada also wouldn't be included because they involving shootings, not car accidents.) And they don't reflect the thousands of unkindnesses drivers inflict on each other daily that don't end in violence.

These figures roughly comport with Washington Post surveys on driver rage. Between 2010 to 2013, the percentage of D.C.-area drivers who say they often felt "uncontrollable anger toward another driver on the road" doubled, from 6 percent to 12 percent. Commuters are more likely to experience blinding rage than non-commuters (no surprise there), the young are more angry than the old (ditto), and politically speaking Democrats are the political group least likely to drive angry, while independents are the most.

A 2013 study by Christine Wickens of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto offers some insight into what gets our blood boiling on the road. Wickens analyzed 5,624 complaints posted to the website roadragers.com, which is an online forum where people can go to blow off steam about bad drivers. The thing that ticks drivers off most? Weaving between lanes and cutting people off. Speeding, general hostility and tailgating are also common complaints.

The Nevada incident illustrates how quickly little acts of aggression can spiral out of control. The shooting victim, Tammy Meyers, honked at a driver who "sped up behind her," according to the NBC News report. The drivers got out and had a verbal altercation, and then Meyers left, picked up her son, who was armed, and went looking for the other driver. After an unsuccessful search she returned home where the driver was waiting for her, and shot her.

The suspect still has not been found.

aexcorp

11:05 AM EST

Honestly, I'm not surprised. What's really shocking is that simple things could really help this. My two pet peevs are 1) drivers who drive the speed limit or below in the left lane, 2) drivers who don't put their blinkers and just stop abruptly to turn. 
 
I honestly think that if all drivers understood the left lane/right lane dichotomy, and that they need to get out of the left lane when they're done "passing" or whatever it is they are doing there, there would be significantly less road rage problems. 
 
The rest of the world has understood this concept, and yet people here just can't seem to get this through their skull.

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dcnate

2/18/2015 10:20 PM EST

"The number of fatal accidents involving enraged drivers has increased nearly tenfold since 2004..." 
 
How can the writer call these "accidents"? They are intentional, not accidental, and are properly labeled crashes.

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Beeker25

2/18/2015 7:56 PM EST

Road rage is happening far frequently due to high stress and other factors that has a person seeing the slightest thing wrong, they get all bunch in a panty knot that can have serious consequences.

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ilovebulldogs

2/18/2015 6:35 PM EST

Stupid woman. Out LOOKING for the guy with her armed son? Gimme a break!

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dduggerbiocepts

2/18/2015 6:11 PM EST

I can only speak for the traffic law enforcement in my areas of Florida's Treasure Coast/Vero Beach to Orlando - it's almost non-existent if speed traps are excluded. People fail to use signal turns, drive in town with their bright lights on and fail to dim them approaching other cars, make illegal lane changes - especially going through lights - none which draws the local police's attention or citations. Add to that some elderly drivers who are simply physically and mentally too incompetent to be driving and you get a road way free for all. If police and their political over-lords will fairly and consistently enforce courteous and save driving beyond just speeding - you'll see a decrease in both accidents and road rage.

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Beeker25

2/18/2015 8:00 PM EST

I see that all the time and the police do not enforce traffic violations which allows offenders to continue do it without impunity. I also have a problem when police officers commits traffic violation as well- like illegal lane change at the light. I saw this happened in Jacksonville and the officer stared at me when I looked at him knowing full well I caught him.

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Jumper

2/18/2015 4:10 PM EST

I remember a guy ran me off the road on a Christmas Eve about 15 years ago. I decided not to be like that guy, so I let all the road anger go since then.