Insurance industry data link NFL games to higher car crash rates

The L.A. Times reports:

On Super Bowl Sunday, the football players will be taking hits on the field. The rest of us will be taking hits on the road.

A variety of insurance industry data links the big game and other NFL matches to an increase in auto collisions.

Sunday is the Super Bowl of drunk driving, according to California safety officials and the Auto Club of Southern California.

Car thefts fell last year, reports the National Insurance Crime Bureau. The Honda Accord topped the list with 53,995 stolen last year. But those thefts were mostly 1990s models which lack the modern theft-prevention technology of the current model. Here are the 10 most stolen cars last year.

They looked at five years of California crash data and found there was a 77% increase in alcohol-related crashes causing injury or death on Super Bowl Sunday. In some communities, such as San Diego, the number of drunk driving crashes more than doubled.

Just a reminder.