SUV trifecta: GM's Blazer Ranked Deadliest Car on U.S. Roadways

The two-door Chevrolet Blazer from General Motors Corp. has the highest driver death rate of any passenger vehicle on U.S. roadways, a research group with links to the insurance industry said on Tuesday.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (news - web sites) based that conclusion, and its embarrassing result for the world's largest automaker, on an extensive study of passenger vehicles from the 1999-2002 model years.

The study focused on the rate of driver deaths in various types of crashes, including both single- and multiple-vehicle accidents.

The overall driver death rate, for 199 models studied during the 2000-2003 calendar years, was 87 per million registered vehicles annually, the Insurance Institute said.

Weighing in at more than three times the overall rate, the Insurance Institute said the two-door, two-wheel-drive Blazer -- a midsize sport utility vehicle -- had an average of 308 driver deaths per million.

The Blazer also had the highest rate of driver deaths in rollover accidents at 251 per million.


Sure, you buy an SUV to show off your profligacy by wasting as much gasoline as possible. But sleep easy knowing you get a death trap at no extra cost.

Very shrewd.

And kudos to the General for doggedly pursuing such a wise and responsible strategery.