Oman police launches campaign to reduce traffic accidents
Awareness campaign called ‘Driving without phone mobile’, aims to reduce road traffic accidents across country
Muscat: Royal Oman Police has launched an awareness campaign entitled “Driving without phone mobile”, that aims to reduce road traffic accidents in the country.
Using phone mobiles while driving claimed 383 lives in Oman in 2015 compared to 428 lives in 2014, according to Royal Oman Police figures.
Brigadier, Mohammad Al Rawas, the Director General of the Traffic Department at the Royal Oman Police (ROP), said the campaigns that will last for a year, aims to reduce the use of mobile phones while driving.
Al Rawas added that brochures and studies that prove the perils of using mobile phones while driving will be distributed to the public nationwide.
Al Rawas further said it also aims to reduce the number of fatalities and injuries by at least 10 per cent compared to last year.
Al Rawas pointed out that the results and statistics related to the use of mobile phones while driving showed that delay in response while talking on phones and driving stood at 27 per cent and went up to 37 per cent while texting or reading messages.
He said some studies showed 80 per cent of collisions occurred as drivers lost attention in the last three seconds before an accident.
Meanwhile, the number of road accidents that occurred in 2015 stood at 6,276, compared to 6,717 in 2014. It resulted in the deaths of 675 people compared to 816 in 2014, according to ROP figures.
Muscat governorates topped in the number of road accidents, registering 2,107 accidents in 2015, resulting in the death of 92 persons and injuring 1,186 others.
July was the deadliest month in 2015, with 71 people dead and 406 injured in 626 road accidents. Speeding was the main cause for accidents in 2015, with 3,411 road accidents.
Those aged 16-50 accounted for 46 per cent of those killed in accidents. 570 males and 107 females were killed in accidents in 2015.
The most fatal accident in 2015 occurred in Haima province last July, due to fatigue, which claimed the lives of seven people and left four people injured.
