Four people died in a tragic accident on the A59 near Sprang-Capelle on Friday evening: a father, mother and two children from Raamsdonksveer. Although dozens of road deaths occur in Brabant every year, so many fatalities in one accident are rare.
Police are still investigating how the accident on the A59 could have happened. That is procedure, especially when there are so many fatalities to regret.
It is the third time in 21 years that four fatalities have occurred in an accident on the A59. In 2002, a car went off the road and crashed into a tree. In 2010, a truck collided with a car on the highway.
Fatal road accidents are becoming rarer
Another Brabant traffic drama took place in Oud Gastel last year. A car collided with another car just entering the intersection. Two young children and two adult women in that car were killed. The lawsuit is still pending. The suspect allegedly drove too fast.
A serious accident on the Helmondsingel near Helmond claimed five lives in 2018. Four people were taken to hospital with serious injuries.
And for example, in recent years there have of course been more accidents in Brabant traffic in which several people died, but apart from a peak in 2018 and 2019, the total number of traffic victims in Brabant has been falling for years.
In 2021, 91 people died in traffic. In 2020 there were 99. Only in 2013 was that number even lower (81). Brabant is also no longer the province with the most road deaths. In 2021, most road casualties occurred in Gelderland and South Holland (94).
One of the worst road accidents
When it comes to the most deadly traffic accidents in our province, the thoughts of many people from Brabant go back to November 1990, when one of the worst traffic accidents in the Netherlands took place on the A16 near Breda. Dense patches of fog in combination with speeding caused a hundred vehicles to collide. Eight people were killed, 27 people were injured, eleven of whom were seriously injured.
If you go further back in time, you end up in 1972 with the traffic disaster on the A16 near Prinsenbeek. On August 25, 13 people were killed and 26 people were seriously injured. The disaster occurred during very dense fog on the road section between the Markbrug and the Prinsenbeek exit.
The high number of deaths in the past prompted the government and the automotive industry to take better safety measures. For example, seat belts became mandatory in June 1975. Cars were made safer by equipping them with cage constructions, crumple zones and airbags.
Trucks
Yet thirteen years later it would hit the province again. In 2003, six people were killed on the N265 near Veghel. A car collided head-on with a truck carrying concrete slabs.
If we delve even further into history, we encounter another accident in 1956. A ‘ overcrowded rental car‘ then collided with a military truck at an intersection near Volkel Air Base. Six were killed.
Also in 1966, in Berlicum, five people were killed after a collision with a lorry. The van ended up in the canal. Two years later, six people in a van lost their lives after again a collision with a truckthen on the Moerdijk bridge.
Other causes
Furthermore, the causes of fatal traffic accidents vary unsurprisingly. In 1972, seven people died in a van near Oosterhout. At the time, the media suspected that the driver fell asleep or became unwell.
In 1992, seven Belgian women were killed in a bus near Breda. According to survivors of the disaster, the driver looked on a road map before the bus collided with a parked truck.
Two years later, five people were killed in a collision in Heesch. The driver who caused the accident took off after the accident, but later reported to the hospital. Alcohol was probably involved.
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