Drunk driving fatalities have plummeted in metropolitan Anchorage, Alaska, over the past decade in conjunction with police force focus and public awareness, Anchorage Police Department reported Tuesday.
This year, only one person has been killed by a drunk driver, in an accident on April 30, Lt. Dave Parker, a department spokesman, announced in a prepared statement. That's compared to 20 DWI-related fatalities a decade ago, in 2002.
APD credited this year's success to a two-pronged campaign that aimed for zero drunk-driving fatalities during the year 2012. Parker says that while there has always been a strong emphasis on patrolling for DWIs, in recent years officers have "taken it to a new level."
Patrolling officers are essentially "drunk hunters," Parker said.
Sixty-six people died due to drunk driving between 2002-2007. APD began to ramp up enforcement in 2008, after 11 drunk driving deaths the year before. Fatalities have decreased steadily since, Parker said in the statement.
Anchorage DWI citizens on patrol
But police aren't the only ones on the lookout for drunk drivers. More than half of DWIs are called in by observers: Of the 2,079 drunken-driving arrests in Anchorage last year, more than 1,000 of those were called in by the public.
"This is a way for the populace to stand up and say – we are not going to take this anymore," Parker said.
DWI enforcement will continue across the Anchorage municipality through December and the holidays, Parker added.
Check out this breakdown of Anchorage DWI arrests and fatalities between 2002-2011.