What causes so many fatal accidents on two-lane highways? To find out where some of those treacherous two-lane roads are, NBC’s Dateline searched the latest five years of accident records stored in a federal database, looking at nearly every traffic fatality on every mile of road in the country — nearly 209,000 deaths in all, including about 24,000 each year on two-lane roads.
First deadly road on the list: U.S. 287 in southern Wyoming, between Laramie and the Colorado border. On this 65-mph stretch, high speeds and heavy commercial-truck traffic push the risk even higher to three times the state average.
The next most dangerous road on the list is South Carolina’s State Route 347, near Myrtle Beach. Here you will find high speeds, trees just feet from the roadway and a fatality rate 16 times higher than on
the nearest interstate.
Colorado’s U.S. 287, near Fort Collins, is another dangerous road.
California’s U.S. 395 is called “Bowling Alley,” the most dangerous stretch being in San Bernardino County.
State Route 308 in southern Louisiana and U.S. 89 in Arizona, between Flagstaff and the Utah border, also made the list.
