Las Vegas Age

Death Begins at
Forty Booklet

HARTFORD, Conn., March 3. - (Special)-Basic reasons for America's shameful automobile accident record in 1937 were "too much speed and too little courtesy" according to a new booklet entitled "Death Begins at 40" just issued by the Travelers Insurance Company. The booklet presents a complete analysis of last year's traffic accidents, based on official figures from the 48 states.

There is no intention in the booklet, according to the editors, to advocate 40 miles an hour or any other fixed speed as top limit. To quote:" . . there are times, as in heavy traffic or heavy fog, when 20 miles an hour is suicidal; other times when 50 miles an hour seems reasonable. Every driver should know, however, that if he does have an accident it is more likely to mean death if he is going fast."

Many of the features in the booklet have been prepared especially to show what happens in the higher brackets of speed. It is pointed out, for instance, that a car is four times harder to stop at 50 miles an hour than it is at 25, and nine times harder to stop at 75 miles an hour than at 25. A new word, "turnability" has been coined to express another speed factor. The driver's turnability, the booklet shows, decreases rapidly as his speed increases. Thus he can make only one fourth as sharp a turn at 50 miles an hour as he could make at 25 and only one ninth as sharp a turn at 75 as at 25.

Another set of figures shows that if you have an accident while driving under 40 miles an hour there is only one chance in 44 that somebody will be killed but if your accident comes while you are traveling faster than 40, there is one chance in 19 that somebody will be killed.