Ambient temperature and risk of motor vehicle crashes: A countrywide analysis in Spain

Good weather for a ride (or not?): how weather conditions impact road accidents — a case study from Wielkopolska (Poland)

“…Unfortunately, data on air conditioning in cars are not available, but one can suppose that in oldest car, which there is still a large number on Polish roads, the air cooling devices are not installed, or are malfunctioning. In a study for Spain (Basagaña and de la Peña-Ramirez 2023 ), analysis impact of cold and hot temperatures showed that the risk of crashes increased with temperature by 15% at the 99th percentile (reference was set at the temperature of minimum risk of accidents within the interval between the 1st and 99th percentile of temperature) and even higher when analyses were restricted to crashes with driver performance due to high temperature (23%). The authors of this research stated that cumulative fatigue caused by warm nights and difficulties in sleeping or cumulative dehydration leads to lower performance and using air conditioning in cars may not prevent against the increased risk of crashes during heat waves.…”

“…The estimated risk of crashes with such factors significantly increased by 1.1% for each 1°C increase in maximum temperature. In study for Spain (Basagaña and de la Peña-Ramirez 2023 ), increase in the risk of crashes with associated factors was even higher up to 23%. He et al ( 2023 ) in their globally research stated that two indices, namely age-standardized mortality rates (ASMR) and age-standardized disability-adjusted life years rates (ASDR) of the road injury attributable to high temperature have decreased, but the absolute death and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) are on the rise.…”

“…In literature reference value is set depending on the analyzed issue, for example in research embracing mortality risk attributable to high and low ambient temperature it was temperature which corresponded to a minimum mortality percentile between the 1st and the 99th percentiles of temperature (Gasparrini et al 2015 ). Similarly, in a study of Basagaña and de la Peña-Ramirez ( 2023 ) conducted for cold and hot temperatures may have impact in increase in risk of crashes, reference was set at the temperature of minimum risk of accidents between the 1st and 99th percentile of temperature.…”

“…Most of studies of the impact of extreme meteorological events on road accidents presented influence of hot or cold temperature (Basagaña et al 2015 ; Liu et al 2017 ; Wu et al 2018 ; Park et al 2021 ; Basagaña and de la Peña-Ramirez 2023 ), some of them on extreme precipitation (Liu et al 2017 ; Jaroszweski and McNamara 2014 , Keay and Simmonds 2005 ), snowfall (Eisenberg and Warner 2005 ; Abohassan et al 2022 ), or seasonal variations in road injuries (Gill and Goldacre 2009 ). The strong wind, low visibility, and temperature were considered in the context of delays caused by a road accident (Su et al 2023 ).…”

Predicting the type of road accidents based on air temperature in Iran: A case study of roads in Qazvin province

“…Liang et al (2021) investigated the effect of temperature on injuries caused by traffic accidents with the mediation of the time factor in Dalian, China, demonstrating a non-linear and delayed relationship between ambient temperature and traffic accident injuries. Basagana & Pena-Ramirez (2023) [ 15 ] estimated the relationship between temperature and the occurrence of accidents in Spain with the mediation of human factors, showing that high temperature increased.…”