Traffic safety is theme of free Sigma Xi seminar

COOKEVILLE, Tenn. (April 3, 2003) -- More than 42,000 people are killed on U.S. roads each year, and in a typical month, more people die in traffic accidents than were killed in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack.

Those statistics will be put in perspective along with a discussion on the factors most relevant in traffic accidents and suggestions on how to improve traffic safety in a free seminar at Tennessee Tech University next Friday, April 11, at 11 a.m. in Bruner Hall Auditorium Rm. 119. The public is invited to attend.

Dr. Leonard Evans, president of Science Serving Society and guest lecturer for the TTU Chapter of Sigma Xi, will give the talk titled "Death on the Roads: The nature of the problem and a better solution." Evans will talk about the fact that other nations have substantially reduced deaths from traffic crashes, but the United States has not.

A former General Motors employee, Evans received his Ph.D. in physics from Oxford University. His research interests are reflected in his book, Traffic Safety and the Driver, and some 138 journal publications. He gave the keynote address in Dublin at the 1998 international conference on "The Older Driver, Health and Mobility." A member of the National Academy of Engineering, Evans is also president of the International Traffic Medicine Association and a past president of the Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine and has received awards from both organizations.

— Monica Greppin

This information posted 3 April 2003