ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · IOWA, IA · DECEMBER 2019
Purpose: Machine-readable JSON endpoint for AI agents, LLMs, researchers, and programmatic consumers. Returns all underlying crash data and AI-generated commentary without HTML.
Authentication: None required. Public endpoint.
GET: https://thatcarhitme.com/api/crash-data/reports/data/iowa/statewide/december-2019-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
5,145 CRASHES IN
IOWA, IA
DECEMBER 2019
In December 2019, there were 5,145 total crashes, a slight increase of 0.6% from the 5,115 crashes recorded in December 2018. While the overall crash volume remained stable, the severity of incidents increased, with fatal crashes rising 22.7% from 22 to 27 and serious injury crashes increasing 23.7% from 76 to 94. This year-over-year data indicates a trend towards more severe outcomes even as the total number of crashes was nearly flat.
5,145
▲ 0.6%was 5,115
Total Crash Events
28
▲ 7.7%was 26
Persons Killed
1,529
▲ 2.5%was 1,492
Persons Injured
27
▲ 22.7%was 22
Fatal Crash Events
Note: "Persons Killed" (28) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (27) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall crash trends remained relatively stable year-over-year, with total crashes increasing by just 0.6% from 5,115 in December 2018 to 5,145 in December 2019. However, the human cost of these incidents trended upward, as total fatalities increased by 7.7% (from 26 to 28) and total injuries rose by 2.5% (from 1,492 to 1,529).
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
1
Pedestrians Killed
0
Cyclists Killed
27
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
34
Pedestrians Injured
9
Cyclists Injured
1,483
Motorists Injured
3
Other Injured
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
The timing of crashes showed a notable shift in the peak day of the week between the two periods. In December 2019, Monday was the day with the most crashes (1,067), a change from the prior year when Friday was the peak day (918). Crashes on Mondays increased by 25.8% year-over-year. The peak hour for collisions, however, remained consistent at 5 p.m. in both periods, recording 596 crashes in December 2019 compared to 610 in the previous year.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
Crash severity worsened from December 2018 to December 2019. The number of fatal crashes rose by 22.7% from 22 to 27, and their share of all crashes increased from 0.4% to 0.5%. Similarly, serious injury crashes saw a 23.7% increase in count, from 76 to 94. Consequently, the proportion of crashes resulting in no injuries decreased from 74.7% to 73.9% of all incidents.
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 27 fatal crash events resulted in 28 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
The leading contributing factors for crashes remained consistent, with 'Animal' being the top cited factor in both periods, increasing slightly from 797 to 802 incidents. 'Followed too close' remained the second most common factor, though its count decreased by 3.6% from 493 to 475. Notably, crashes attributed to 'Ran Traffic Signal' increased significantly in count by 33.6%, rising from 134 in December 2018 to 179 in December 2019, moving it from the 11th-ranked factor to the 9th.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Driving conditions varied significantly between the two periods. In December 2019, there was a substantial increase in crashes on snowy roads, with the count more than doubling from 227 to 475. Conversely, crashes on wet roads decreased by 40.3% (from 771 to 460), and incidents during freezing rain dropped from 363 to 100. The proportion of crashes happening on dry road surfaces increased from 52.1% to 57.8%. Lighting conditions remained proportionally similar year-over-year.
Weather
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The makes of vehicles involved in crashes remained largely consistent year-over-year. Ford was the top make in both periods, though its involvement decreased from 1,483 vehicles in December 2018 to 1,396 in December 2019. Chevrolet, listed under both 'CHEV' and 'CHEVROLET', collectively remained the second most common make involved in collisions. The number of Toyota vehicles involved (listed across 'TOYT', 'TOYOTA', and 'TOYO') increased from a combined 673 to 769.
Top Vehicle Makes (8,669 vehicles)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Vehicle unit records
1,457 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart.
Sex Distribution (7,840 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Data Sources & Methodology
Primary Data Source
All crash data in this report is sourced from Iowa Crash Data, accessed programmatically via the ArcGIS Open Data API (SODA). This dataset contains official police-reported motor vehicle traffic crash records maintained by the reporting jurisdiction's law enforcement agency. Records are published to the open data portal by the municipality and are subject to the portal's terms of use.
Data Retrieval
- Access method: ArcGIS Open Data API (SoQL queries)
- Data format: Structured JSON via REST API
- Record types queried: Crash events, person records, and vehicle unit records
- Date filter applied: 2019-12-01 through 2019-12-31
- Report generated: September 9, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2019-12-01 through 2019-12-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: iowa, IA
- Total crash records analyzed: 5,145
- Total persons involved: 11,634
- Total vehicles involved: 8,669
Analytical Methodology
- Severity classification: Uses the KABCO injury scale (K=Fatal, A=Incapacitating injury, B=Non-incapacitating injury, C=Possible injury, O=No injury/property damage only), the standard classification in U.S. Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria (MMUCC). Severity is assigned per crash event based on the most severe injury in that crash. A single fatal crash (K) may involve multiple fatalities; therefore the "Persons Killed" count in the headline KPIs may differ from the "Fatal" crash count in the severity breakdown.
- Contributing factors: Reflect the officer-determined primary contributory cause recorded at the time of the crash report. These are preliminary determinations and may not reflect final investigation findings.
- Hit-and-run classification: Based on the hit-and-run indicator field in the official crash report, as determined by the responding officer at the scene.
- Temporal analysis: Day-of-week and hour-of-day distributions are computed from the crash date/time timestamp in each record.
- Demographics: Age and sex distributions are drawn from person-level records linked to each crash event. A single crash may involve multiple persons.
- Vehicle data: Make information is drawn from vehicle unit records linked to each crash event.
- AI commentary: Narrative sections are generated by Google Gemini (large language model) based on the structured data. Commentary is descriptive, not predictive, and should not be interpreted as expert opinion.
Limitations & Disclaimers
- Only crashes reported to and documented by law enforcement are included. Minor incidents, unreported crashes, and near-misses are not captured in this dataset.
- Data reflects conditions at the time of the initial police report and may be subject to subsequent corrections, reclassifications, or supplements by the reporting agency.
- Open data portal records may experience a publication lag - recently occurring crashes may not yet appear in the dataset at the time of report generation.
- AI-generated commentary is produced by a large language model and is intended to highlight patterns in the data. It does not constitute legal, medical, or professional analysis.
- Percentages are calculated from reported data and are subject to rounding.
Non-Affiliation Disclosure
This report is produced independently by ThatCarHitMe.com (Injuria.ai). It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or produced in partnership with any law enforcement agency, municipal government, state department of transportation, or the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Data is sourced from publicly available government open data portals.
Data License
The underlying crash data is provided under the municipality's Open Data Terms of Use and is made available to the public for unrestricted use. This analysis and report is © 2026 Injuria.ai and may be cited with attribution using the suggested citation below.
Corrections & Feedback
If you believe any data in this report is inaccurate or have questions about our methodology, please contact: data@injuria.ai. We are committed to accuracy and will issue corrections promptly.
Suggested Citation
ThatCarHitMe.com (Injuria.ai). "iowa, IA Crash Intelligence Report: December 2019." Published September 9, 2026. Reporting period: 2019-12-01 to 2019-12-31. Data source: Iowa Crash Data, ArcGIS Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/iowa/statewide/december-2019-report
About the Publisher
ThatCarHitMe.com is a crash data intelligence platform developed by Injuria.ai, a legal technology company specializing in traffic safety analytics. We aggregate and analyze publicly available government crash data to produce structured intelligence reports for communities, researchers, journalists, and legal professionals. Our reports combine programmatic data retrieval from official open data portals with AI-assisted narrative analysis.
Questions about this report's data or methodology: data@injuria.ai
ThatCarHitMe.com · An Injuria.ai Company
ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
Crash Data Intelligence
Data: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS
Period: 2019-12-01 – 2019-12-31
Generated: September 9, 2026 · All rights reserved