The most dangerous countries to drive in; Thailand ranks #2

[fatdrunkandstupid]

Who believes these statistics ?

Me.

I had a house in Phuket that was on a quiet soi that joined with Thepkrassatri Road. During the two years I lived there I saw hundreds of accidents on that corner. Yes HUNDREDS not dozens. Eight of these accidents resulted in a fatality. A was a cop directing traffic was amongst the victims.

I have spent my life travelling around the world and in my opinion, the road over the mountain to Patong, and Thepkrassatri Road are the two most deadly strips of tarmac on earth.

[smileydude]

These figures hold true if your riding a motorcycle and live in the provinces.

The reason why the stats are so high for Thailand is because of motorcycle accidents, which usually involve one of the following:

Drinking and driving (especially holidays like Songkran)

driving into oncoming traffic

cutting in on the left of vehicles who are turning

changing lanes at whim without signaling

drag racing to impress the girls

Basically its driving with no regards to traffic laws.

If you drive a vehicle other then a motorcycle and don't often sit in the back of a pickup your odds of survival increase dramatically.

If you drive mainly in Bangkok your odds are even better.

Edited February 22, 2014 by smileydude

[garrya]

Well we can not blame this on Thaksin or suthep. But we can blame the Department of Motor vehicles and the trafic police.

And the attitude or the personality traits.

Unfortunately driving recklessly with grin on the face is just part of the culture. Seeing this is just as sad as a child without toys.

[garrya]

Valid or not.. Thailand is really a bad place for safety driving... really scary. !!!

Its very strange to me that so many people are scared of driving in Thailand and seem to feel that they are in constant danger. I have been driving here for 10 years and I enjoy it much more than driving in Australia which is so boring that the main problem is staying awake. Mind you, I mainly drive is Isaan and avoid the hell holes of Pattaya, Phuket and Chiang Mai. I have driven in Bangkok a few times which was great, if a trifle slow.

That you have positive experiences doesn't change the facts. Why not listen to others and believe what they say? Be happy that you have luckily avoided accidents, but please don't try to spread how great driving in Thailand is.

[garrya]

I feel safer riding a motor cycle in Thailand, than I would in Australia.

In Thailand most road users appear to be awake and generally pay attention.

In Australia the few motor bikes go unnoticed by the car drivers who drive so slowly to avoid being ticketed by a camera that they are asleep most of the time.

Incidentally trading death for life permanently in a wheelchair or other potentially awful existence never seems to show up in this type of directed statistics.

This surely is a joke post!

It must be a joke, or the sir is just a regular visitor without knowing what's going on.

[Tanlic]

Wait a minute here these figures are total rubbish if you are talking about driving you should talk about cars on the road NOT talk population surely?

OK pedestrians die but this specifically talks about dangerous places to drive.

If you take the figures for fatalities for every 100,000 cars/drivers on the road what then ?

Thailand are miles away from the top in 48th place making the country a lot less dangerous than the 47 in front of them.

Might not seem that way but those are the facts

[Mudcrab]

The article is so flawed that I hope the author paid to have it published as opposed to actually getting paid for such a schlock job.

How is it so flawed? Provide us with a better synopsis then? Seems quite true when put up against results of other data and info.

The flaw is in that it presents the data as deaths per head of population not in deaths per passenger kilometre travelled. In a highly mobile population such as Thailand, with high passenger loads (overloaded pick-ups, motorbikes with 3 or more passengers). I suspect if they tallied up the distance travelled , per person, and used this is a basis for the statistics the outcome would be very different. The airlines have used this method for years.

[impulse]

The article is so flawed that I hope the author paid to have it published as opposed to actually getting paid for such a schlock job.

How is it so flawed? Provide us with a better synopsis then? Seems quite true when put up against results of other data and info.

The flaw is in that it presents the data as deaths per head of population not in deaths per passenger kilometre travelled. In a highly mobile population such as Thailand, with high passenger loads (overloaded pick-ups, motorbikes with 3 or more passengers). I suspect if they tallied up the distance travelled , per person, and used this is a basis for the statistics the outcome would be very different. The airlines have used this method for years.

+1 What he said. Plus a few other places the author played so fast and loose with cars, vehicles, passengers, population and how the numbers tie all of them together- or in this case, don't tie them.

[ginjag]

To have figures that make sense surely you have to have comparable countries and approx. same number of say-example. CARS.

If the UK approx. same population---and land area, and say 10 million cars, I would then accept most stats.

The same with motor cycles. population, numbers of bikes on the road, you can have a rough idea on what is the most dangerous.

Simply crazy to compare SUDAN with THAILAND on the danger. Or any other country Holland/USA compare--stupid.

Normally you get out of computers what you feed in, This list that was submitted by a poster is only what someone compiled for debate rather than reality.

I would doubt the car death rate is as bad as many some other countries BUT the motorcycle deaths -Thailand could fill that number 1 spot with a comparable population and number of bikes ridden.

[andy1956]

After driving in chiang mai for twenty days, i can say its not that bad. The rules are just guidelines and everyone knows that. You drive cautiously and defensively, you will be fine. Sure i saw a lot of stupid driving, but then again i saw no agro like i see in my home country, australia.. Statistics are a guide but dont tell the whole story.

[Larry001]

There really are some people on this forum who just won't admit Thailand is a dangerous place. tal about having your head in the sand. LOS - thats a fallacy also

[wilcopops]

Again and again there are a groups of people posting whose view of road safety is so myopic they can only see one issue and that is the standard of driving. This is then given a dash of racism and it all becomes clear - "Thais are crap at driving" - this simply doesn't add up and as driving etas are interpretable in so many ways citing them to support a preconceived idea seems to some to be logical - of course it isn't.The FIRST thing about the "problems" associated with driving in Thailand is that they are NOT down to one single issue.

If you know anything about driving and road safety you will see that there are a multitude of issues to address and personal anecdote etc is pure flummery for the single issue obsessed.

Edited February 22, 2014 by wilcopops

[lockman]

My problem with this "article" is nothing is taken into account on type of vehicles and people transported. How may of us have been on a clearly overloaded songtow or see 15 in the back of a pickup truck going to work or coming back. Or a bus filled to standing (and none left) room only. I would say if that was factored in, it's not nearly as bad. Would many of the worst countries practices be allowed in any of the least countries? Also in the least countries, is drivers education a requirement in their schools, as well as a mandatory proficiency test? Otherwise it's like comparing apples to melons.

[lineofentry]

All Thai drivers with an internal combustion engine simply think that they have a very fast buffalo and drive accordingly. If everyone remembers this and makes suitable allowances there is no problem at all.

[takkatan in the land]

i think thailand is very safe for drive if look the other country.

but ...

have to know how to drive

yes you are actually right countries like burundi, rwanda even cambodia are worse

¨there is no worst blind that the one who is not willing to see´

[kokosracer]

The number of died in hospitals after accident doesn't include in such statistics in Russia

[Artist]

Valid or not.. Thailand is really a bad place for safety driving... really scary. !!!

Its very strange to me that so many people are scared of driving in Thailand and seem to feel that they are in constant danger. I have been driving here for 10 years and I enjoy it much more than driving in Australia which is so boring that the main problem is staying awake. Mind you, I mainly drive is Isaan and avoid the hell holes of Pattaya, Phuket and Chiang Mai. I have driven in Bangkok a few times which was great, if a trifle slow.

That you have positive experiences doesn't change the facts. Why not listen to others and believe what they say? Be happy that you have luckily avoided accidents, but please don't try to spread how great driving in Thailand is.

Please don't spread alarmist rubbish about how dangerous it is to drive in Thailand. I have been driving here for ten years and I have seen no more accidents than I would in Australia. I don't care what the statistics say as I know this from my own personal experience.

Driving here looks very dangerous. People overtake on blind bends, there is a mixture of slow and fast traffic with motorcycles etc, people tailgate and especially at some times of the year there are drunks driving.

This is compensated for by the standard of Thai driving. Drivers are alert and ready for the unexpected. Most drivers are polite and un-aggressive (unlike Australia), the main roads are well engineered and almost always have shoulder areas which you can pull on to when some idiot is coming the other way in your lane.

I drive fast at the same speed as the rest of the fast traffic, I always leave plenty of braking distance, on long journeys I drive with my lights on. The only situation which worries me is overtaking large trucks in dual carriageway with a median strip. Sometimes there is a vehicle in the path of the truck which I can't see (stopped for some reason) and I worry that I might get forced into the median strip. In practice Thai truck drivers are very aware of this and usually give way to me or indicate they are changing lanes.

I am sure that the statistics reflect a real higher risk from driving in Thailand but its nowhere near as bad as the scaremongers claim (maybe its worse in some areas of the country I don't visit like Phuket). The alternative is to bring in such restrictive rules and enforce them as they do in Australia where there is a real lack of freedom and people behave like sheep. I would hate to see that happen to Thailand.

[Artist]

There really are some people on this forum who just won't admit Thailand is a dangerous place. tal about having your head in the sand. LOS - thats a fallacy also

You need to take into account individual experience. I don't know whether you are claiming that Thailand is a dangerous place from personal experience or from the media.

In Australia I live in the Perth Hills which is a quiet and safe place, in Thailand I live in Phon Phisai, Nong Khai which is also a quiet and safe place.

If I lived in the inner suburbs of Perth and frequented the entertainment areas I would say that Perth is a dangerous place as I would if I lived in Patong or Pattaya. So it depends on where you live and your experiences.

Please dont claim that some of us are stupid or lying when we state that from our own experience over a long period that Thailand is not any more dangerous where we live than a similar Western country. How much experience do you have of living outside the capital cities of Thailand?

[bbbbooboo]

lol....the thais wont be happy with this. They always want to be #1

[prvtdetdave]

Queue the usual 'Thailand, hub of...' posts and other crap.

I have safely driven maybe three quarters of a million miles in Los between 1977 and now. There's probably some who have done even more.

Sure it would be very risky for someone who had never, driven in LOS to get behind the wheel of a car at Suvarnabhumi and drive to (say) Pai on the pre-Songkran weekend... but who on earth does that?

There's loads of stats on what kills the most foreigners in Thailand but I don't recall it being driving related. Even if we look at the very high risk motorcycle accident victim, outside the tourists spots, you don't see a lot of foreigners on 2-wheels.

Many may drive accident free. but unfortunatley many others do not.

Its risky if you have driven here a hundred years.

The survey includes motorcycles. It's not crap, it's people lives.

As far as foreigners on 2 wheels you must be in an unusual area or a shut in.

[prvtdetdave]

Queue the usual 'Thailand, hub of...' posts and other crap.

I have safely driven maybe three quarters of a million miles in Los between 1977 and now. There's probably some who have done even more.

Sure it would be very risky for someone who had never, driven in LOS to get behind the wheel of a car at Suvarnabhumi and drive to (say) Pai on the pre-Songkran weekend... but who on earth does that?

There's loads of stats on what kills the most foreigners in Thailand but I don't recall it being driving related. Even if we look at the very high risk motorcycle accident victim, outside the tourists spots, you don't see a lot of foreigners on 2-wheels.

Total rubbish

[bbbbooboo]

Thailand is the only S E Asian country I have driven in and to call the driving standards and practices here dangerous would be an understatement. Bordering often on lethal, the wilful stupidity which leads to the dangerousness, I witness on a daily basis, is shocking and unmitigated

[wilcopops]

I really think that those posting their personal experiences should consider if their "offerings" are evidence of anything but but their own limited perception and analysis.

Personal experience is for the most part worthless especially when offered as a conclusive comment on a much, much bigger picture.

Edited February 23, 2014 by wilcopops

[Artist]

I really think that those posting their personal experiences should consider if their "offerings" are evidence of anything but but their own limited perception and analysis.

Personal experience is for the most part worthless especially when offered as a conclusive comment on a much, much bigger picture.

Of course you must be correct we should ignore those with experience who know what actually happens and accept the wildly exaggerated claims of those whose experience is limited to the media and holidays in Pattaya or Phuket. Well done wilcopops for coming up with this startling original and meaningless proposition.

[Artist]

Queue the usual 'Thailand, hub of...' posts and other crap.

I have safely driven maybe three quarters of a million miles in Los between 1977 and now. There's probably some who have done even more.

Sure it would be very risky for someone who had never, driven in LOS to get behind the wheel of a car at Suvarnabhumi and drive to (say) Pai on the pre-Songkran weekend... but who on earth does that?

There's loads of stats on what kills the most foreigners in Thailand but I don't recall it being driving related. Even if we look at the very high risk motorcycle accident victim, outside the tourists spots, you don't see a lot of foreigners on 2-wheels.

Total rubbish

How many miles have you driven in Thailand prvtdetdave to support your rude conclusion that NanLaew's post is "Total rubbish"?

[Artist]

Queue the usual 'Thailand, hub of...' posts and other crap.

I have safely driven maybe three quarters of a million miles in Los between 1977 and now. There's probably some who have done even more.

Sure it would be very risky for someone who had never, driven in LOS to get behind the wheel of a car at Suvarnabhumi and drive to (say) Pai on the pre-Songkran weekend... but who on earth does that?

There's loads of stats on what kills the most foreigners in Thailand but I don't recall it being driving related. Even if we look at the very high risk motorcycle accident victim, outside the tourists spots, you don't see a lot of foreigners on 2-wheels.

Many may drive accident free. but unfortunatley many others do not.

Its risky if you have driven here a hundred years.

The survey includes motorcycles. It's not crap, it's people lives.

As far as foreigners on 2 wheels you must be in an unusual area or a shut in.

Your statement about foreigners on 2 wheels illustrates the problem here. We have people who live in or who have visited the main tourist centres saying they have totally different experiences from people who live in rural areas. As far as I am concerned NanLaew is correct as in my area there are few foreigners on two wheels partly as there aren't many farangs.

It would be good if members posting on both side of this argument appreciated that the driving risks vary according to the area in which you live (or for some visited on holiday).

[VocalNeal]

What a depressingly negative thread, for the most part. If you guys don't like it here why stay?

[garrya]

What a depressingly negative thread, for the most part. If you guys don't like it here why stay?

Freedom of speech?

Expressing ourselves?

Why not form an opinion?

Why not address issues?

Why do people have to like something despicable?

Why do you think people don't find other things they can like here?

Why do you read this forum if you are not interested in a debate?

Why don't you understand that people have different opinions?

Does not liking one thing mean people have to run away?

[simondan]

Will these stats be skewed by populations figures? Indian roads are much more dangerous in my view - but the population of India is so vast and only a comparatively small % owns a bike or car - so accidents by head of population will be diluted.

I would rank India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Philippines, Cambodia above Thailand from what I've seen of the roads - but perhaps fewer people own cars and bikes?

Er, the stats are per 100,000 people. That means popln size has been considered.

Of course, countries collect data in different ways so these results may not be directly comparable.

But thats stats for you.

Sent from my GT-I9300T using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[Basil B]

Seems the UK Gov website gives more weight to the dangers of the current political unrest than traveling on or crossing any public highway.