ThatCarHitMe.com
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YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · IOWA, IA · JULY 2017
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/july-2017-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
4,250 CRASHES IN
IOWA, IA
JULY 2017
In July 2017, Iowa recorded 4,250 vehicle crashes, a 5.2% increase from the 4,040 crashes reported in July 2016. While total crashes and injuries rose, the number of fatalities decreased from 38 to 33 year-over-year. The most notable temporal shift was the peak day for crashes, which moved from Friday in the prior period to Monday in the current period.
4,250
▲ 5.2%was 4,040
Total Crash Events
33
▼ -13.2%was 38
Persons Killed
1,661
▲ 5.6%was 1,573
Persons Injured
32
▲ 6.7%was 30
Fatal Crash Events
Note: "Persons Killed" (33) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (32) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall traffic collisions in Iowa showed an upward trend in July 2017 compared to the same month in 2016. Total crashes increased by 210 incidents (a 5.2% rise), and the number of people injured grew by 88 (a 5.6% increase). Conversely, traffic fatalities saw a significant decrease, falling by 13.2% from 38 to 33 deaths.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
0
Pedestrians Killed
1
Cyclists Killed
32
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
28
Pedestrians Injured
45
Cyclists Injured
1,585
Motorists Injured
3
Other Injured
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
The temporal patterns of crashes showed a notable shift between the two periods. In July 2017, Monday was the peak day for crashes with 708 incidents, a change from July 2016 when Friday was the busiest day with 759 crashes. The peak hour for collisions remained consistent at 4 p.m. in both periods, though the number of crashes during that hour increased from 327 to 390.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
The overall severity distribution of crashes remained relatively stable year-over-year. The fatal crash rate saw a marginal increase from 0.74 to 0.75 per 100 crashes. Crashes resulting in serious injury accounted for 3.0% of all incidents in both July 2017 and July 2016. The proportion of minor injury crashes increased slightly from a 10.9% share to an 11.6% share, while no-injury crashes saw a minor proportional decrease from a 67.6% share to 67.3%.
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 32 fatal crash events resulted in 33 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
Comparing contributing factors, 'Followed too close' remained a leading cause despite a 5.5% decrease in count from 526 incidents in July 2016 to 497 in July 2017. Crashes involving an animal, the second most common factor, increased by 7.8% from 383 to 413. Notably, crashes attributed to 'Ran Stop Sign' saw a significant 30.7% increase in count, rising from 114 to 149 incidents year-over-year.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
The proportion of crashes occurring in adverse conditions saw a slight decrease in July 2017 compared to July 2016. Crashes on non-dry road surfaces made up 8.4% of the total in the current period, down from a 10.4% share in the prior period. Similarly, crashes in adverse weather (rain, fog, etc.) accounted for 3.6% of all incidents, a decrease from 4.4% the previous year. The proportion of crashes in low-light conditions (dark, dusk, or dawn) remained stable at approximately 18% in both periods.
Weather
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
Ford and Chevrolet (including 'CHEV' and 'CHEVROLET' entries) were the top two vehicle makes involved in crashes in both periods, with their rankings remaining unchanged. A comparison of persons involved shows a decrease in the share of individuals in the 16-20 age group, which fell from 15.4% of all persons with a known age in July 2016 to 14.1% in July 2017. The total number of persons involved in crashes also decreased from 8,373 to 7,952, despite an increase in the total number of crashes.
Top Vehicle Makes (7,452 vehicles)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · Vehicle unit records
1,014 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart.
Sex Distribution (4,904 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31 · 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: 2017-07-01 through 2017-07-31
- Report generated: September 9, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2017-07-01 through 2017-07-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: iowa, IA
- Total crash records analyzed: 4,250
- Total persons involved: 7,952
- Total vehicles involved: 7,452
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: July 2017." Published September 9, 2026. Reporting period: 2017-07-01 to 2017-07-31. Data source: Iowa Crash Data, ArcGIS Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/iowa/statewide/july-2017-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: 2017-07-01 – 2017-07-31
Generated: September 9, 2026 · All rights reserved