Maybe there’s something to the Friday the 13th superstition. That day of the week indeed appears to be unlucky, at least on the road.
In Carfax’s annual crash and damage report, it found Fridays outweigh all other days of the week for road danger in most U.S. states.
Just six states had higher crash rates on other days of the week. It’s Wednesday in Montana, and Tuesday in Colorado, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Utah and Vermont. Carfax said it wasn’t able to compile enough data to determine Hawaii and Illinois’ worst road days.
Fridays sealed their dubious distinction with an average share of the week’s crashes of about 17% in the 43 states with the highest crash rates on that day, Carfax found. Eighteen percent of Mississippi’s crashes occurred on Fridays.
That compares to the 10% share of crashes in the 47 states where Sunday is the least accident-prone.
The vehicle data provider arrived at the days-of-the-week breakdown by crunching 2024 numbers from 165,000 sources ranging from state motor vehicles departments to local auto repair shops, said spokesperson Em Nguyen.
“Law enforcement responds to thousands of crashes on Fridays, often due to heavy traffic, fatigue, and distracted or impaired driving,” said John Fisher, chief of Bedford, Massachusetts’ police department in Carfax’s press release on the crash report.
Despite Friday’s road dangers, though, more traffic deaths actually happen on Saturdays, Fisher said, citing National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data.
