Seasonal climatic variations and road accidents in Lagos, Nigeria

Type Conference Paper - Climate change, transportation, telecommunication and energy
Title Seasonal climatic variations and road accidents in Lagos, Nigeria
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2014
URL https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ayeni_Amidu_Owolabi/publication/261705347_Seasonal_Climatic_Var​iations_and_Road_Accidents_in_Lagos_Nigeria/links/0046353513af4b69b7000000.pdf
Abstract
There are various causes of road accidents, some of which include carelessness, drunkenness, malfunctioning
traffic lights, bad roads, road worthless vehicles and climatic conditions. This study examined
road accidents in Lagos State, Nigeria in relation to seasonal climatic variations for 6 years (2005 - 2010).
The road accidents data were sourced from the archives of the Federal Road Safety Commission and
Nigeria Police Force (RS 2.1 Lagos) while the climatic data were sourced from the Nigerian
Meteorological Agency Oshodi, Lagos. In order to generate the total monthly occurrence of road
accidents, the number of accidents occurred in each month were summed while monthly climatic
variables average was determined using Arithmetic mean. The results revealed that on the average,
46.69% accidents occurred in dry season. This indicates an increase of 6.62% in the rainy season. The
higher cases of recorded accidents in the rainy season are attributed to the slippery condition of road
surfaces and low visibility. The casualty cases is about 45.64% during the dry season which increased by
8.64% in the raining season. The highest and lowest casualties were recorded in the June and April
respectively. Of the 4375 death recorded, 50.22% occurred in dry season with the highest incidence of
431 in the month of December. Correlations results shown strong positive relationship between rainfall
and accident cases while temperature and accident cases revealed a negative relationship. The results
indicate that the frequency of accidents is nearly equal in all climatic soasons, but higher in the wet
weather.

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