Road Transportation in Yobe State: The Accident Dimension on Damaturu-Potiskum Road

Abstract

Due to the growth of the number of people killed and seriously injured on roads worldwide, road accident has been acknowledged as a global phenomenon, which becomes an issue that requires proper attention from authorities of virtually all countries across the globe. An evaluation into the contributions of human, road, and vehicular factors on accidents along Damaturu- Potiskum road of Yobe state have been conducted, aimed at segregating accidents recorded from 2017 to 2019 into severity index, vehicular types involve and fatality rate. The methodology used is a mixture of primary data, secondary data, and field surveys. The outcome of the investigation revealed that,64% of the total accidents recorded was contributed by human factor, while vehicular and road factors contributed to 36 and 3% respectively. Likewise, 49% of the vehicles involved are private cars, 34% commercial cars and 17% are other vehicular types. However, 28% of the accidents recorded are fatal, 30 and 42% of the accidents are serious and minor cases respectively with no fatality. Thirty-four (34%) of the total persons involved in the accidents died. The outcome further revealed that the accident rate varies every quarter, likewise the severity index. The results of the Chi-Square test of significance obtained, backed the earlier findings that there was a significant difference among the various causes of the accidents, the accident cases (fatal, serious or minor) and types of vehicles involved. The study further revealed that 67% of the drivers have no valid driver’s license and 70% of the vehicle inspected have at least 3 defects. It was therefore recommended that an attempt should be made to report an accident by location to identify accident-prone areas to effectively provide remedial measures.