The Federal Road Safety Corps not too long ago altered the word describing driver-induced road disasters involving auto vehicles from “accidents” to “crashes”.
The reason the road safety officials gave for this conspicuous change at the time, which is still tenable today, was that investigations showed that more than 80 percent of road disasters were not accidents at all but incidents that could be attributed to human error.
Interestingly, this argument becomes illuminating when the meaning of the word accident is taken into context. An accident is defined as an unfortunate incident that happens “unintentionally”, typically resulting in damage or injury (death).
Can we then really say that the disasters on our roads happen “unintentionally”?