Highway traffic fatalities in Korea have surged this year, raising awareness about safe driving. With accident risks rising particularly in summer, when frequent rain makes road surfaces slippery, the Korea Expressway Corporation has been providing safe-driving guidelines while further strengthening its disaster management system for storm and flood preparedness.
According to the Korea Expressway Corporation on the 27th, highway traffic fatalities this year reached 109 (as of the 20th), a sharp increase from 72 in the same period a year earlier. In summer, when typhoons follow the monsoon season, hazards such as heavy rain and strong winds can occur simultaneously and increase the likelihood of major accidents, potentially raising the death toll further and requiring particular caution.
While rain-related accidents account for a small share of total accidents, they carry a high risk of casualties once they occur. According to the Korea Road Traffic Authority, there were 1,928 rain-related highway traffic accidents over the five years from 2021 to last year, or about 3.2% of the total. However, the fatality rate was 4.7 deaths per 100 accidents, about 1.4 times higher than the 3.4 on clear days.
The first principle of safe driving in the rain is to slow down and maintain a safe following distance. When it rains, drivers should reduce speed by more than 20% and by more than 50% during heavy rain, while securing more than double the safe distance. According to an experiment by the Korea Transportation Safety Authority, a passenger car's braking distance on a wet road was 18.1 meters, about 1.8 times longer than the 9.9 meters on a dry surface. Braking distances for trucks (24.3 meters) and buses (28.9 meters) increased 1.6 times and 1.7 times, respectively. Larger and heavier vehicles have longer braking distances, so they must slow down earlier and secure a wider safe distance.
Drivers should also avoid sudden acceleration, sudden braking, and sudden lane changes. Abrupt maneuvers on wet surfaces can throw a vehicle off balance and lead to skidding accidents. On highways in particular, a single abrupt maneuver can escalate into a multi-vehicle pileup involving following vehicles. When strong wind and rain make visibility poor, it is advisable to stop at a rest area or drowsiness shelter and wait for weather conditions to improve, rather than forcing the drive. Checking tires, wipers, and lights before departure is also essential.
The Korea Expressway Corporation has strengthened its preparations to protect road users in summer. It has designated the period from May 15 to October 15 as the "Summer Storm and Flood Countermeasure Period" and is continuously inspecting vulnerable facilities. After analyzing last year's reinforced-earth retaining wall collapse, it completed a comprehensive special inspection, repair, and reinforcement of all reinforced-earth retaining walls nationwide, and also completed maintenance of vulnerable facilities such as slopes, drainage systems, and underpasses.
Smart disaster management is being carried out in parallel. Danger signs are monitored around the clock through an "integrated cable bridge measurement system" and a "river water level monitoring system," and mobile closed-circuit television (CCTV) energy storage systems (ESS) have been deployed to 59 branch offices nationwide in preparation for communication network paralysis. Low-Earth-orbit satellite communications (Starlink) and satellite phones have been introduced at 12 branch offices with low ground base station density, including Jecheon in North Chungcheong Province, Muju in North Jeolla Province, and Yeongju in North Gyeongsang Province, enabling the transmission and reception of video and voice data even during communication failures. "In cooperation with the Korea Meteorological Administration, we plan to build customized highway weather observation equipment in stages, with the goal of completion next year, and to provide dedicated weather information to users in real time," a Korea Expressway Corporation official said. "We will actively utilize advanced technologies to prevent traffic accidents during the vacation season."
