Drivers Reminded To Stay Alert For Work Zone Awareness Month

SEATTLE — After a number of high-profile and even deadly crashes in Western Washington last month, the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) is urging drivers to be careful on the highways for Work Zone Awareness Month.

Work Zone Awareness Month aims to highlight the increased dangers that construction workers and drivers face in work zones. It is held every April, but WSDOT says this year it's especially pressing.

"While March seemed to have a spike in serious collisions, it continued a trend we’ve seen since the COVID pandemic began in early 2020," writes WSDOT's Mike Allende. "Since that time, while the total number of crashes dropped, the seriousness of them increased, and it’s a worrying trend as we head into warmer months when we expect more people to be on the roads. And that doesn’t mean just people in cars. More pedestrians and people on bicycles and motorcycles will be out to enjoy our beautiful Pacific Northwest spring and summer. More roadworkers will be out with drier, more favorable weather. And we want them all to be safe."

Several of last month's crashes involved work zones, including one on I-5 in Tacoma. The crash seriously injured two contractors. In another, a WSDOT attenuator truck was trying to divert traffic around a disabled vehicle on I-90, and was hit from behind by a suspected drunk driver.

"That’s why we’re again asking the traveling public to help us curb this trend – we need everyone, every day to be looking out for themselves and others around them. Because from a statewide view, the past month has been truly alarming," Allende said.

Work zone crashes can be caused all sorts of ways, by drivers going too fast, by impaired or negligent drivers, even by drivers who've failed to secure their loads— like a recently deadly crash in Mountlake Terrace, where a mattress flew off a truck, causing the car behind it to swerve into a nearby semi and killing the driver.

"But while there are a number of causes, one thing is common among them: they are also all preventable," Allende said. "Speed. Impairment. Distracted driving. Carelessness securing loads. These are all decisions that drivers make either behind the wheel or before they get into vehicles. All of these decisions put themselves, other travelers and highway workers in danger. And they all lead to terrible results."

So slow down, pay attention to the road, don't drink and drive, and you could save someone's life this month.