Characteristics and causes of particularly major road traffic accidents involving commercial vehicles in China

Abstract

Major accidents occurred frequently in the road transportation industry, and the resulting harm to drivers, property loss, and traffic interruption are very serious. This study investigated 11 particularly major accidents involving commercial vehicles in China, and performed analysis on accident characteristics regarding the time, location, types of vehicles, and accident causation at different levels based on the 24Model. Large buses and dangerous goods vehicles were involved in 10 accidents and they all occurred on a freeway. The months from May to August, especially during the time periods of 2:00–4:00 and 14:00–16:00 every day, were the most prone to accidents. The driver’s speeding and fatigued driving, and vehicle failure were the direct causes of most of the accidents. The defects in organizational safety management involved 12 system elements, such as safety accountability, education and training, etc. Procedures are of no use if they were not followed, and there was often no effective process to assess the implementation of procedures in many organizations. The weaknesses in organizational safety culture were the source of accidents, which was mainly manifested in members’ inadequate cognition of key elements in the aspects of safety importance, safety commitment, safety management system, etc. Understanding the characteristics and root causes of accidents can help to prevent the recurrence of similar mistakes and strengthen preventative measures in road transportation enterprises.