Czech police recorded 455 deaths in road traffic accidents in the Czech Republic last year, one more than in 2022 and the second lowest number since records began in 1961, Deputy Police President Tomas Lerch and traffic police director Jiri Zly told journalists today.
They said that 94,945 traffic accidents were recorded in 2023, 3,515 fewer than in 2022.
Zly said that on average, a road collision occurred in the country once every five and a half minutes last year.
The number of injured people rose by 1,501 year-on-year, to 25,687. The amount of material damage also increased, reaching almost CZK 7.7 billion.
The most deadly month in 2023 was June, when 51 people died on the roads. February, November and December had the lowest number of fatalities, with 27 people killed in collisions each.
Most often, in more than one-fifth of cases, the crashes occurred because the driver was not fully concentrating on driving. Among the main causes of fatal crashes were driving into oncoming traffic or not adjusting speed to road conditions, Lerch and Zly said. Friday was the day of the week when most collisions occurred and Sunday the least.
74 pedestrians died on the roads in 2023, most of them in January and February. Zly said the higher number of deaths in the winter months was related to reduced visibility. He also said that one third of these victims were not typical pedestrians, but people who, for example, got out of their car onto the road, were lying on the road and were run over, or were crossing the motorway. The death toll of pedestrians was lowest in June and July.
Last year, 39 cyclists and 70 motorcycle drivers died on the roads. Zly noted that there had been 58 deaths of motorcycle drivers on the roads in 2022.
The region with the most traffic accidents with consequences for life and health happened was Central Bohemia (80) in 2023. On the contrary, only 15 such accidents occurred in the Karlovy Vary Region.
The vast majority of all collisions, almost 80,000, were caused by the drivers of motor vehicles. Forest or domestic animals caused more than 11,000, drivers of non-motorized vehicles about 3,600, and pedestrians about 1,000 accidents.
At the end of last year, the police announced that 461 people died on Czech roads in 2023, and earlier this week they said the death toll was 462. Zly said the difference in figures was due to administrative mistakes, as people who died were recorded as victims of traffic collisions, whereas some of them had actually committed suicide.
Death toll of road traffic collisions in Czechia from 2013 to 2023:
| 2013 | 583 |
| 2014 | 629 |
| 2015 | 660 |
| 2016 | 545 |
| 2017 | 502 |
| 2018 | 565 |
| 2019 | 547 |
| 2020 | 460 |
| 2021 | 470 |
| 2022 | 454 |
| 2023 | 455 |
