TISPOL Bulletin August 2019

#ProjectEDWARD social media campaign starts Sunday 1 September Download everything you need right here The #ProjectEDWARD social media library and schedule has been launched to increase support for this year’s European Day Without A Road Death. The library includes a recommended timetable of social media activity, with themes and images for each day in September leading up to Project EDWARD Day on Thursday 26. Any supporting organisations and individuals are invited to access the library and download the resources in good time for the launch of the social media campaign on Sunday 1 September. You can download the social media schedule, images and other #ProjectEDWARD artwork right now from the resources page of the Project Edward website. Choose your download now... Please share and send your #ProjectEDWARD photographs We are happy to share a few recent #ProjectEDWARD pictures as we approach the intensive stage of the 2019 initiative and EDWARD day itself on Thursday 26 September: PC Mark Keane and Sgt Lucy Bassett from Dyfed-Powys Neighbourhood Policing Team in Brecon. They will be coordinating Community Speedwatch activities throughout September. The team from UKROEd, the UK organisation responsible for the management and administration of the NDORS Scheme on behalf of the Road Safety Trust.  Police officers in the far north of Norway with the EDWARD sign. The sign has now been taken to the island of Svalbard in the Arctic Ocean, which is the northernmost point of Europe - barely more than 1000km from the Arctic Circle! Send your EDWARD picture to us here and we will do our best to share as many as we can on social media and the website!   Global Light of Hope award to former TISPOL General Secretary for Project EDWARD We're very pleased to report that our former General Secretary Ruth Purdie has received a Global Light of Hope award from the Irish Road Victims Association. The award was made for her work as "a leading advocate for road safety through her great work as General Secretary in TISPOL (2014 - 2018) and in particular with TISPOL’s Project EDWARD, the European Day Without a Road Death." This is something which bereaved families, the Gardai, the Road Safety Authority and the Health & Safety Authority very actively support in September every year here in Ireland. Donna Price of the IRVA said: "Project EDWARD has made a significant contribution to raising public awareness for road safety and road victims throughout Europe, and in so doing has no doubt helped to save lives and prevent serious injury. "We were therefore very pleased to present this very well-deserved award to Ruth Purdie and her team in TISPOL for all of their efforts in promoting Project EDWARD."   Updates from across Europe... Latest road fatality data from Eurostat Bulgaria has the European Union’s highest rate of fatal road accidents, with 64 deaths per million inhabitants, almost six times the lowest rate, that of Malta (11 deaths per million inhabitants). However, Bulgaria along with Estonia has  the EU’s lowest rate of deaths amongst motorcyclists. No motorcyclists were killed in either country in 2016 or 2017, the years covered by the Eurostat figures. Romania  has the highest rate of deaths among pedestrians in road traffic collisions (37 deaths per million inhabitants) as well as the highest number of cyclists killed in road collisions as a proportion of the population (10 deaths per million inhabitants).   Greece is first for motorcycle fatalities in European Union Official European crash data released recently by Eurostat shows that Greece sadly stands in first place when it comes to the rate of people killed while riding motorcycles. Among all the 28 nations of the EU, Greece ranked first in 2017, with 20.1 fatalities for every million residents, to be followed only by the island of Malta, which recorded 20 deaths per million residents. The third place was occupied by Italy and the fourth by Slovenia. The data show that EU’s southern states face a much bigger problem when it comes to road safety for motorcyclists. This, said a spokesperson, was most likely due to the fact that motorcyclists were much greater in number compared to northern nations, due to the good weather conditions which prevail in the south. Full story >>   Slovenia: police record more than 3,000 violations during TISPOL speed week Police detected more than 3,000 speed limit violations last week as part of the TISPOL Europe-wide speed enforcement operation. Most violations occurred in villages and towns, according to the General Police Administration. Between 12 and 18 August police officers recorded 3,048 speed limit violations and gave out 207 warnings as well. A majority of those violations (almost 2,500) took place in urban areas, while some 330 occurred outside villages or towns and some 220 on highways and expressways.   Denmark:cycle helmet campaign targets older riders A road safety campaign in Denmark is urging older cyclists to wear helmets and ride bikes that are easier to climb on and dismount. Launched by road safety agency Rådet for Sikker Trafik and TrygFonden, the campaign points out that half of Denmark’s cyclist fatalities involve people aged over 65. Some 37 per cent of survey respondents aged 65 and above said that losing balance while trying to get on or off a bike was the most common cause of their sustaining a cycling-related injury. Full story >>   Germany: slight reduction in road fatalities for first half of 2019 Fewer people died on German roads in the first half of 2019, despite a slight increase in the number of traffic collisions, according to provisional figures from the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) published last week. During the first six months of the year, the number of people killed on German roads fell by 40 to 1,465, a decrease of 2.7 percent compared to the previous year, the statistical office stated. Meanwhile, the total number of accidents increased slightly by 0.4 percent to almost 1.3 million in Germany in the first half of 2019, according to the figures. Full story >>   UK: Welsh officers welcome Finnish colleagues for four-day study tour Members of the Dyfed-Powys Roads Policing Unit will be welcoming colleagues from Finland this week. The Finns, who organised a winter driving skills course for Sgt Owen Dillon and three colleagues from Dyfed-Powys earlier this year, will be based at Dyfed-Powys headquarters in Carmarthen and will spend time examining advanced pursuit driving and management techniques. Their team will consist of Chief Instructor Jukka Isotalo, deputy Harri Niinioja and two additional instructors, Ari Korhonen and Mika Toukula. The picture shows Harri Niinioja (centre front) with British officers (left to right) PC Mark Jones, Sgt Owen Dillon, PC Julian Clegg and PC Rob Griffiths.