Two risky hours when it’s wise to avoid being behind wheel

THE most likely time to die on Queensland roads is between 2pm and 4pm.

And the most likely day is on a Saturday, according to new figures.

An analysis of 10 years of figures also shows more people die on the roads in the afternoon and night than the morning. There were 1243 people who died between midnight and midday, compared with 1809 from midday to midnight.

Figures show 410 people died between 2pm- 4pm over the past decade, compared with 130 who died between 2am and 4am.

While a spike of vehicles at peak commute times meant more crashes, Sunshine Coast University senior research fellow Dr Bridie Scott- Parker said 2pm was a “terrible time on the road”.

She said people were sleepier around 2pm- 4pm and motorists should travel in the morning or around 7- 8pm when it was safer.

“Human beings have a circadian rhythm – and that’s a rhythm in our body which we have had since the beginning of time – telling our bodies this is a time to rest, this is a time to be awake,” Dr Scott- Parker said. “We have two messages that come to our body at 2am and 2pm. That is when our body is most likely to need to rest.

“So we might not even be aware that we are fatigued, maybe we are just a bit distracted when we are driving and we’re more likely to crash because we might not be as alert as normal.”

The road toll was also the least on Monday, progressively increasing every day to Saturday, before decreasing on Sunday.

Dr Scott- Parker said the most dangerous time for young drivers was on the weekend, any time between 6pm Friday and 6am Monday.

“Some of which relate to showing off, going to and from parties with friends in the car, they mightn’t be obeying speed limits if they’d happen to have a couple of friends who have had a drink and who are encouraging them to show off in the car,” she said.

“It can also be related to inexperience.

“They might not simply have the experience at 2am in the morning and they might have just passed their driving tests.”