The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s annual Click It or Ticket seat-belt crackdown is focusing on nighttime belt use May 21 through June 3.
New NHTSA research found that in 2005, more than 15,000 passenger vehicle occupants died in traffic crashes between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. Almost two-thirds of those killed were not wearing their seat belts at the time of the crash.
The survey also indicated that nighttime seat-belt use is often 10 percent lower than the daytime average of 82 percent.
“It’s alarming that fewer people are buckling up at night, a time when the odds of being killed in a motor vehicle crash triple,” says Nicole Nason, NHTSA administrator.
