Half of BC drivers using winter tires this year: ICBC

The snow will soon fall in parts of BC, which means drivers should have winter tires on their vehicle.

Serious crashes involving injury or death from last year’s snow and icy weather increased by 10% compared to 2015.

Certain driving behaviours need to change thanks to the worsening road conditions.

“So we have the fog starting to come in this time of year, starting to see the ice in the morning on the vehicles which means the roads got ice on them as well so we really have to adjust ourselves to how we need to drive when we’re out there this time of year,” says Doug MacDonald, ICBC Road Safety Manager.

A recent survey from ICBC shows only 48% of drivers who were approached plan to or already have their winter tires on.

“We’re seeing more people buying winter tires, upgrading their winter tires making sure they’re not using just an all-season type of tire and when we see the number of people that are actually putting winter tires on we know that the people are starting to see the importance again of putting those on,” added MacDonald.

“If we look at a month like October, we’d be looking at something along the lines of approximately 17 injured or killed people per month and then going into December we see the crash and fatality numbers are about 40 per month.”

In North Central BC, casualty crashes double every year as the weather worsens.

The spike is mostly due to drivers going too fast for conditions.

Some of the top five challenges for northern drivers this year include using their headlights are on when the visibility and weather are poor and to never pass highway maintenance vehicles when they’re on the road.