Louisiana is expected to have more fatal crashes on interstates in 2022. Here's why.

The Louisiana Highway Safety Commission is warning residents not to drive after drinking during the Fourth of July holiday after 100 were injured and six killed in alcohol-related crashes on Independence Day 2021.

Louisiana is expected to have a near-record number of fatal crashes on its interstates in 2022, though areas like Acadiana have seen low numbers of deadly crashes so far this year, data from LSU shows.

“Six people died during one holiday period last year because people thought it was OK to drive after they had been drinking,” said Safety Commission Executive Director Lisa Freeman in a release. “One of the biggest travel threats to families is an impaired driver, so we are taking impaired drivers off the highway to ensure safety for travelers this holiday.”

Halfway through the year, the eight parishes in Acadiana have recorded 39 total fatal crashes, according to the LSU Center for Analytics and Research in Transportation Safety. So far in 2022, the region has only recorded 34.8% of the 112 total fatal crashes in all of 2021.

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The state saw a significant increase in deadly crashes in 2021, with fatal crashes increasing by 15.9% from 2020. Generally, the state is seeing fatal crashes decline across the board — only 276 have been recorded in 2022, accounting for 31.3% of the 2021 total — but the state's interstates have still seen high numbers of fatal crashes.

The state's interstates are projected to have 149 fatal crashes in 2022, according to the LSU reports, accounting for 174 total deaths. The projected total would be the highest since 2006 when the state had 153 fatal crashes on interstates.

The projected fatal crash total is only slightly above the 2021 figure of 146 crashes, but 2021's fatal crash total jumped significantly from 2020.

In 2020, Louisiana's interstates had 103 fatal crashes accounting for 117 deaths, according to the LSU data. That year, there were around 0.81 fatalities per 100 million miles traveled on the state's interstates.

But in 2021, the number of fatal crashes increased by 41.7% from the previous year and fatalities increased by 45.3%. The number of fatalities per 100 million miles traveled rose to 1.18.

This year, the number of deadly crashes and deaths is expected to continue rising, at least on the interstates. Nearly half of the projected interstate fatal crashes — 45.3% — are expected to be on I-10. In 2021, the interstate accounted for around 45.9% of the fatal crashes.

The state's interstate system has seen fatal crashes increase dramatically over the last five years. In 2017, I-10 had 43 total fatal crashes, but that figure has increased 55.8% to the 2022 projected total. I-49 has seen its crash numbers more than double since 2017, going from nine to 21 in 2021.

But Acadiana's parishes have not seen the same rapid rise in fatal crashes. Deadly crashes have generally been increasing in the eight-parish region since 2019, but they have not grown at the same rate, increasing about 23.1% over that period.

Lafayette Parish has the most deadly crashes in the region by a significant margin. In 2022, Lafayette Parish has 16 fatal crashes, about 41% of the region's total. In all of 2021, the parish had 33 crashes — 29.5% of the region's total.

The City of Lafayette has the most fatal crashes of any single area in Acadiana with 10 in 2022. In 2021, the city had 17.

Lafayette Parish is the only parish in Acadiana in the top ten for fatal crashes in 2022, ranking third behind East Baton Rouge's 28 and Caddo's 18.

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This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: Louisiana expected to have more fatal crashes on interstates in 2022