Read the record · Crash table

One crash, one severity category

The Fatal, Injury and Tow columns count crashes. They do not count every person affected or every vehicle towed. Read the category before adding the numbers.

Sources checked · All examples below are fictional.

Fictional event · No real carrier

Several consequences can belong to the same crash

SAFER’s field help says that each crash is recorded once, at its highest level of severity. Consider one invented crash involving a fatality, three injuries and a tow-away:

Consequences of this single fictional event

  • 1 fatality

    Part of the same event

  • 3 injuries

    Part of the same event

  • A tow-away

    Part of the same event

Contribution to the crash table

1 crash in Fatal

This event contributes 0 additional crashes to Injury and 0 to Tow. Its contribution to Total is 1.

Do not add the fatality, injuries and tow-away as separate crashes. The category is about the event’s highest severity, not a sum of its consequences.

Separate fictional example · Invented aggregate

Add the category counts to read Total

Here is a made-up U.S. crash summary for one reporting window. Each crash has already been assigned to one category.

Fatal
1
Crash classified as fatal · fictional
Injury
2
Crashes classified as injury · fictional
Tow
3
Crashes classified as tow-away · fictional

Fictional total

1 + 2 + 3 = 6

Six crashes in this example. It does not tell you the number of injured people, fatalities or towed vehicles across those events.

If your copied categories do not reconcile with the displayed Total, check the source, dates and transcription. Do not invent a missing category or edit the original record to make it add up.

Keep the window and geography with the count

  1. 1. Match the record

    Keep the USDOT identity and source URL with your notes. These examples are unrelated to any transport company.

  2. 2. Copy the displayed cutoff

    The U.S. snapshot checked for this guide labels crashes reported for the 24 months before its displayed cutoff. Record that wording and date from the snapshot you actually use; your access date is different.

  3. 3. Keep U.S. and Canadian blocks separate

    Do not merge their counts or assume that identical-looking labels establish identical reporting rules. Read the field help for the block you are using.

  4. 4. Preserve the missing information

    A blank or unavailable value is not automatically zero. A count without exposure data does not produce a per-mile or per-trip rate.

This page explains how to read recorded categories and totals. It does not rate a carrier, assign responsibility for an event or recommend a booking decision.

Sources and scope

Definitions and the highest-severity rule: SAFER General Help, “Crashes”. The Fatal, Injury, Tow and Total labels and reporting-window wording were checked in an official Company Snapshot on October 31, 2026. Source access is not a new regulatory version. All numbers shown in this guide are invented teaching examples.