Escapees March/April 2016

Avoid Injury And Vehicle Damage

By Betty Mulcahy #76334

deer each year that result in $1 billion in vehicle damage, about 150 human fatalities and over 10,000 personal injuries.” And those are only the sta- tistics from reported incidents. The Jackson Hole Wildlife Foun- dation reports an average of 300 elk, deer and moose are killed on Teton County roads in Wyoming each year, not to mention smaller animals that lose their lives to traf ¿ c. “Everything, from grizzly to elk to moose to eagles to snakes to squirrels to marmots, is killed every year,” says Cory Hatch, executive director of the Wildlife Foundation. In an attempt to save wildlife and spare motorists the costs and injuries of collisions with wildlife, the Jackson Hole Wildlife Foundation created the program, Give Wildlife a Brake ™. Part of the program involves placing portable electronic message signs that display various messages along roadsides to alert drivers of wild- life hotspots. “This tool can change human behavior by alerting drivers of wildlife hazards,” according to the Wildlife Foundation Website. “In- forming a driver of a hazard improves their reaction time, giving them a signi ¿ cantly better chance of avoiding a wildlife collision.”

After spending a few months in an overcrowded section of the country, my husband, Chuck, and I were relieved to once again drive the open roads of the West, admiring the vistas and grandeur along the way. With no other vehicles in sight and feeling like I owned the road, I relaxed at the wheel and clicked on cruise control.

S uddenly, a small herd of deer bounded in front of us. My rev- erie switched to alarm and then to alert. How many warning signs had I missed? How many more deer were poised and ready to cross the road? “Pay attention to wildlife cross- ing signs!” says Mary Ann Bonnell, Ranger One with Jefferson County Open Space in Colorado. A lot of highway departments work to provide safe crossings. They research where animals cross and what makes them want to cross there.” Fences draw animals to certain points, according to Mary Ann, and create concentrated animal crossings. “Pay attention to different speed lim- its,” she says. “Too many people feel like, ‘Whatever…’” It has been estimated that a million furry, feathered and scaly animals a day become roadkill in the United States. Animals are attracted to road surfaces for other reasons than merely crossing. Many are attracted by salt and gravel. Snakes are attracted by

heat. Some animals are attracted by fruit trees in medians. And roadkill can have collateral damage as crows, coyotes and other scavengers are attracted by roadkill carcasses. Some drivers swerve to avoid small animals darting onto the road. “Mo- torists have caused serious accidents by trying to swerve or stop to avoid a squirrel in the road,” reports Wiki- pedia. “Such evasive maneuvers are pointless, since small rodents and birds are much more agile and have much quicker reaction times than motorists in heavy vehicles.” Most human fatalities in animal-related crashes, according to Good2Go Auto Insurance, are caused by drivers swerving to miss the animal and then hitting other objects. But while striking a small animal may not in À ict injury other than to the animal itself, colliding with large animals can. “According to the National High- way Traf ¿ c Safety Administration,” reports car-accidents.com, “there are about 1.5 million car accidents with

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