ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · IOWA, IA · DECEMBER 2024
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-2024-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
4,967 CRASHES IN
IOWA, IA
DECEMBER 2024
In December 2024, Iowa recorded 4,967 vehicle crashes, a 14.9% increase from the 4,322 crashes reported in December 2023. This rise was accompanied by a slight increase in fatalities from 34 to 36 year-over-year. The most significant shift was a substantial increase in crashes attributed to adverse winter conditions, with incidents involving snow or ice on the road surface rising from 222 in the prior year to 1,122 in the current period.
4,967
▲ 14.9%was 4,322
Total Crash Events
36
▲ 5.9%was 34
Persons Killed
1,299
▲ 8.3%was 1,199
Persons Injured
29
▲ 7.4%was 27
Fatal Crash Events
Note: "Persons Killed" (36) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (29) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall traffic crash trends in Iowa show a notable increase year-over-year. Total crashes rose by 14.9%, from 4,322 in December 2023 to 4,967 in December 2024. This included a rise in total injuries from 1,199 to 1,299 and a slight increase in fatalities from 34 to 36.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
2
Pedestrians Killed
0
Cyclists Killed
34
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
32
Pedestrians Injured
13
Cyclists Injured
1,252
Motorists Injured
2
Other Injured
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · 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 significant shift in the peak day of the week. While the 5 p.m. hour remained the peak time for collisions in both periods, the peak day moved from Friday (863 crashes) in December 2023 to Monday (1,110 crashes) in December 2024. The number of crashes on Mondays more than doubled year-over-year, increasing from 523 to 1,110.
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
While the total number of fatal crashes increased slightly from 27 to 29 year-over-year, the fatal crash rate as a percentage of all crashes decreased from 0.62% to 0.58%. The number of crashes involving serious injuries grew from 57 to 77, and their share of all crashes increased from 1.3% to 1.6%. Conversely, the share of crashes resulting in minor or possible injuries decreased, while the proportion of no-injury crashes rose from 74.3% to 75.7%.
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 29 fatal crash events resulted in 36 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution (Crash Events)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
Collisions with animals remained the top contributing factor in both periods, with counts remaining stable at 753 in December 2024 compared to 760 in the prior year. The most dramatic change was in crashes attributed to 'Driving too fast for conditions,' which surged by 198% from 172 to 513, moving this factor from the seventh-ranked cause to the second. Similarly, crashes involving 'Ran off road - left' increased in count by 73% from 253 to 438.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Adverse weather and road surface conditions were significantly more prevalent factors in crashes compared to the previous year. Crashes occurring on roads with ice or snow increased from 222 in December 2023 to 1,122 in December 2024. Correspondingly, crashes during snowy or freezing rain conditions rose from 213 to 687. Despite this, daylight hours and clear weather still accounted for the largest single block of crashes in both periods, though crashes on dry roads decreased from 2,645 to 2,457.
Weather
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The makes of vehicles involved in crashes remained consistent year-over-year, with Ford and Chevrolet models being the most common in both periods, reflecting their market prevalence. The total number of vehicles involved in collisions increased from 7,194 to 8,208, in line with the overall rise in crashes. The distribution of driver age groups also showed little change, with drivers aged 26-34 and 35-44 representing the largest cohorts in both December 2023 and December 2024.
Top Vehicle Makes (8,208 vehicles)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · Vehicle unit records
930 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart.
Sex Distribution (5,438 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31 · 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: 2024-12-01 through 2024-12-31
- Report generated: September 9, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2024-12-01 through 2024-12-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: iowa, IA
- Total crash records analyzed: 4,967
- Total persons involved: 8,476
- Total vehicles involved: 8,208
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 2024." Published September 9, 2026. Reporting period: 2024-12-01 to 2024-12-31. Data source: Iowa Crash Data, ArcGIS Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/iowa/statewide/december-2024-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: 2024-12-01 – 2024-12-31
Generated: September 9, 2026 · All rights reserved