Fatal Roads

By Shaher Tabbaa

Edited by: Rima Aleisa

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, about 19 fatalities happen everyday and 6800 fatalities per year. Calculating the fatalities of people out of 100,000 people in Saudi, I realized it is a bigger ratio than China’s which is the most populated country on earth. Many apparent dangers are causing everyday problems on the wide three laned roads of Saudi. Many problems occur like lack of respecting the traffic lights, speeding through lanes, racing.

 

AIS-R’s director of operations Dan Summers who is out every morning directing the cars was asked about the behaviors and driving of the underage and experienced drivers, and was to compare. “Well naturally, as you know, teenagers like to put their feet on the pedal a bit more,” he said, “but again, you know, students once their told once, uh, they’re actually very respectful.” To some people this may be surprising because usually the younger them more daring, but as Mr. Summers mentioned that impatience was the way to provoke a driver in the queue, it seems that it still didn’t have more of an effect on the teens of AIS-R.

 

A reporter from Arab News had interviewed an underage driver, Faisal. He has been driving since he was 12. “You don’t understand,” he said. “It is perfectly acceptable in Saudi culture for young boys to drive. You are a better driver when you learn young. It’s my father who taught me how to drive and I drive with his permission.”

According to Arab News, out of 500,000 road accidents in Saudi Arabia last year, nine or 10 percent were caused by underage drivers. “Yes, I drive. I don't think it will affect the road because I am a good driver.” Amro Al-Sahhaf, a local student in AIS-R said. Comparing Amro’s response to Samina Ludlow, another girl in AIS-R, “Yes I’m a good driver but I think I’d probably affect the roads.” Samina said.

 

My drivers and parents thought of solutions of the messy driving here in Saudi, and they may think that women may help the “treacherous” driving. According to the Dailymail, a female/female crash happens about 20.5 percent of the time while they only drive 40 percent of the time, but a male/male crash happens about 31.9 percent of the time while they drive 60 percent of the time in the U.S.A. So the answer is to some people that, maybe they would help a bit but they still crash a ton, although, women tend to crash more at cross roads, slip roads, and T-junctions.

 

It may be fair to some people to say that Saudi Arabia has one the most dangerous roads today with approximately 6800 fatalities per year and about 103 road fatalities per 100,000 motor vehicles. Based on the green prophet, a study at the King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), a Riyadh-based scientific research group, warned that if the current rise in road accident rates is not curbed, Saudi Arabia will have over 4 million traffic accidents a year by 2030, which means these rates of the Saudi roads are ever growing.