Holiday Road Deaths May Be Record Low

California drivers appeared to be on their way to a record low in traffic deaths over the Thanksgiving weekend, if the trend holds, but fatalities are up in Los Angeles County, the California Highway Patrol reported Sunday.

Between 6 p.m. Wednesday and 6 a.m. Sunday, 17 people were killed on California highways, far fewer fatalities than last year’s 50 during the same period, said CHP Officer Glen Dominguez. Last year’s numbers included 17 people killed in a massive 164-car pileup caused by blinding dust storms on Interstate 5 near Coalinga.

Four fatalities were recorded in Los Angeles County during the first 84 hours of the weekend, but no one was killed in traffic accidents in the county during the same period last year, Dominguez said.

The CHP officer said it was unclear what may have contributed to the rise in Los Angeles traffic deaths.

“It’s really hard to say, but we have to continue to put out the message that people must wear their seat belts, avoid drinking and driving and always use extreme caution,” Dominguez said.

One of the Los Angeles County fatalities was Julio Diaz, 20, of Lake View Terrace, who died in what police believe was an alcohol-related accident just after midnight Saturday in San Fernando. He was in the front seat of a car that collided head-on with another vehicle at Glenoaks Boulevard and Arroyo Avenue, said San Fernando police officials. Several other people, including the driver of the other car, were injured, but none seriously, police said.

The first county fatality was a 16-year-old girl who ran a stop sign and struck another vehicle at about 11:30 p.m. on Thanksgiving day, near Union Pacific and Kern avenues in East Los Angeles, said CHP Officer Susan Billat.

Early Friday morning, a 30-year-old man was struck and killed while walking on the Santa Monica Freeway east of Crenshaw Boulevard, Billat said. Also on Friday, a motorcyclist died after he lost control of his bike at Calle Bogota, south of San Jose Road, near Sante Fe Springs, the officer said.

A 42-year-old man was killed on Friday when his car drifted over the center divider and struck another vehicle head-on on the northbound California 14 Freeway, south of Pearblossom Highway.

Despite the steep decline in traffic deaths statewide, authorities cautioned that the last hours of the holiday weekend are usually the most perilous and that fatalities could be boosted by drivers hurrying to return home Sunday.

The weekend toll included one fatality in Northern California, three in the San Francisco Bay Area, four people in both Central California and the San Diego area and one in the Inland Empire.

Dominguez noted that eight of the 17 deaths were people not wearing seat belts.

According to CHP statistics, a record low 43 people were killed in traffic accidents in 1975. The highest toll--88--was recorded during Thanksgiving weekend in 1970.

This year, motorists negotiating California’s heavily traveled highways seemed to have encountered unusually good driving conditions up and down the state.

“The weather can change from one county to the next and for the most part it’s been beautiful,” Dominguez said. “If it rains on a heavy traffic day when people are returning from a holiday, it can be a mess. The weather we had this year has been a blessing.”