Eighteen people have been killed in seven separate crashes on various B.C. highways in six days — 14 of those deaths in a 60-hour period.
And while those investigations are in the early stages still, a BC Highway Patrol officer says they will most likely fall into the top-three primary causes for collisions: speed, impaired driving and distracted driving.
"It's good weather and people are starting holidays. We've had a heat wave. We've got more people that are on the roads at this time of the year, they feel comfortable driving, the roads are, really, in ideal road conditions, so people are driving fast," Insp. Chad Badry said.
Badry said in this day and age everybody is distracted by cellphones and other things while they're driving around.
"It's really unfortunate and this seems to be just an unfortunate series that's happened all in a tight amount of time."
Two people were killed in a crash along Highway 1 near Boston Bar on Thursday (July 11), Upper Fraser Valley RCMP said. BC Highway Patrol is investigating and has not released how many vehicles were involved in the crash.
A woman was ejected from a vehicle along Highway 99 in Surrey in the early hours of Thursday, Surrey RCMP said. She was found deceased at the scene. Two other occupants, the driver and another passenger, were trapped in the single-vehicle collision.
A 70-year-old motorcyclist was killed in a single-vehicle crash along Golden Ears Way in Pitt Meadows Wednesday evening. Ridge Meadows RCMP said the driver of the motorcycle lost control and collided with the centre median, throwing the man off the motorcycle. He died at the scene.
Four adult members of an extended family were killed in a crash involving another vehicle and a tractor trailer, just outside of Keremeos on Highway 3 Wednesday, Keremeos RCMP said. The four all died at the scene, but the occupants of the other vehicles were uninjured.
Late Tuesday, three passengers died after the vehicle they were in went off the highway and down an embankment near Invermere. The driver survived and was taken to hospital with serious, but non-life-threatening injuries. Columbia Valley RCMP said speed and intoxication were believed to be factors.
A family of three – two parents and an infant – was killed in a head-on crash with a semi-truck along Highway 7 near Agassiz in the early hours of Tuesday. Upper Fraser Valley RCMP said the adults died at the scene, but the infant was transported to hospital by air ambulance and died a few hours later. The driver of the semi was uninjured.
Four days earlier, four people from Nelson were killed after their passenger truck collided with a semi-trailer. Slocan RCMP said the driver of the semi attempted to avoid the collision, but the trailer hit a ditch, flipped the semi over and hit the passenger truck. The driver of the semi had to be rescued by witnesses after the vehicle, which was carrying a 100,000-pound load of timber, caught fire and was destroyed.
Badry said it did seem like there has been a higher number of fatal crashes in recent days.
"Any fatal collision is too many, but yeah, it does seem like there's a higher number than we typically see at this time."
ICBC says impaired-driving related crashes spike 27 per cent every summer in B.C.
However, some regions of the province record larger increases, such as northern B.C. at 63 per cent and 53 per cent in the southern Interior. The Lower Mainland sees an 11-per-cent increase, while Vancouver Island sees a 21-per-cent increase.
Badry said the province "seems to have a culture of speed." The speed limit, he said, is for ideal road conditions and to help keep everyone safe, but "it would be really nice to have everybody drive below the speed limit."
"Even if your car can go fast, and you might feel comfortable doing that, there's all kinds of factors, like curves in the road and animals, that need to be considered."
His second reminder was to drive sober.
"If you're going to imbibe in alcohol, or anything else potentially impairing, including prescription drugs and illegal drugs, you should never be behind the wheel of a vehicle. Even if you feel like you're sober."
The last thing, he said, was to pay attention.
"We have so many things that distract us in this current society. You need to focus on the road, put your cellphone somewhere else and pull over if it's an urgent notification that you have to look at."
BC Highway Patrol is currently in the middle of its summer CounterAttack campaign that goes to the end of August. Badry said drivers should expect to see an increased number of road checks out on B.C. highways, targeting commercial vehicles, speeders, impaired and distracted drivers.
"We want to prevent this. Ideally, we have no crashes and that's what we'd like to see."
