Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 90.djvu/116

 Freakish Accidents

Your home — the most dan- gerous place in the world

��CAREFULLY compiled statistics show that at present the num- ber of accidental deaths occur- ring annually in this country amount

��nothing to do with it when it is gained.

One of the most interesting facts is

the mitigation of old and the rise of new

hazards. This process is going on to

���An automobile attempted to crawl under a house which it found unexpectedly in the roadway. Two men were pinned under the front seat and the fire department had to be called upon to jack up the house in order to release them. They were not seriously hurt

��to about seventy-eight thousand, and more than eleven million injuries re- sult from accidents yearly.

Industrial accidents have a place of their own. Large as their number is, and their increase up to a few years ago was constant, yet the problem of indus- trial accidents is under process of control. But in re- lation to the una- voidable accidents to which all men are liable np such means of preven- tion are applicable.

Our streets are daily becoming more and more con- gested. Our activi- ties seem constant- ly to increase. Men rush to save a min- ute of time with

���This fire truck, traveling at full speed, ran into a tree. The truck was wrecked and two firemen were seriously injured

��a greater or less extent in every direction. For instance, fifteen years ago bicycles were a considerable cause of accident. The automobile was unknown. To-day the bicycle has practically disappeared as a cause while the automobile has rushed from obscur- ity to the third place in importance, contributing in 1915 nearly twenty per cent of the total number of ac- cidents.

Contrary to be- lief, street accidents occur oftener in the least congested areas, rather than in places where traf- fic and people are most congested and the danger more apparent.

The percentage

��100

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