Durham · Crash numbers
Durham and Durham County Traffic Crash Figures for 2024
In the 2024 state crash book, Durham's city row shows 8,355 crashes, 3,021 injuries and 28 fatalities, and the county trend table shows 34 people killed in Durham County that year. Those totals describe Durham as a whole. None of them can say who caused your crash or put a value on your claim.
People killed in crashes, Durham County
| 2024 | 34 |
|---|---|
| 2023 | 43 |
| Yearly average, 2014 to 2023 | 31 |
Most figures on this page come from the 2024 edition of Traffic Crash Facts, the latest one the NCDMV offers as a download. NCDOT's Durham County Crash Profile for 2024 supplies the rest, and each section lists its sources beneath it.
The agencies and courthouses behind a Durham case have their own Durham crash page. The sections here take up Durham's city row, county deaths since 2014, the county profile by severity, why the city and county counts differ, school bus crashes, and what the numbers cannot settle.
01
8,355 crashes on Durham's line of the 2024 city table
Page 28 of the NCDMV's 2024 Crash Facts carries Durham's entry in the City Crash Data section, with 8,355 crashes in the column group headed All. The table below gives that group's fatalities and injuries beside the three other groups in the same entry: Alcohol, Pedestrian, Bicycle.
| Column group, as printed | Crashes | Fatalities | Injuries |
|---|---|---|---|
| All | 8,355 | 28 | 3,021 |
| Alcohol | 239 | 7 | 186 |
| Pedestrian | 128 | 6 | 133 |
| Bicycle | 27 | 1 | 24 |
The statewide figures come from the same edition's 2024 General Crash Picture. I put them here for scale and nothing more.
Read across Durham's row, alcohol crashes make up a small part of the city's crash count and a much larger part of its deaths. Pedestrian crashes work the same way. A table like this one counts events, and it never says which driver or walker did what in any of them.
02
Durham County's yearly traffic deaths from 2014 to 2024
The Fatalities by County: 10 Year Trend table, on the 2024 edition's page 6, puts Durham County at 34 traffic deaths for 2024. For 2023 it shows 43, and its printed 10 Year Average column reads 31.
| Year | Durham County deaths |
|---|---|
| 2014 | 27 |
| 2015 | 25 |
| 2016 | 22 |
| 2017 | 29 |
| 2018 | 32 |
| 2019 | 36 |
| 2020 | 36 |
| 2021 | 23 |
| 2022 | 33 |
| 2023 | 43 |
| 10 Year Average (printed column) | 31 |
| 2024 | 34 |
The printed average sits after the 2023 column and before 2024, and no footnote defines it. The mean of the 2014 through 2023 values, 30.6, rounds to it.
The county count covers all of Durham County, inside the city and outside it. It measures something different from Durham's city row.
03
Durham County's 2024 crash profile, sorted by injury severity
For 2024, NCDOT's Durham County Crash Profile shows 10,004 reportable crashes countywide. The profile splits that total by severity into Fatal, Non Fatal Injury and PDO (No Injury) rows, and it prints an injury count beside the crash count in every row except PDO.
| Severity, as the profile labels it | Crashes | Injuries |
|---|---|---|
| Fatal | 33 | 34 |
| Non Fatal Injury | 2,413 | 3,512 |
| PDO (No Injury) | 7,558 | none printed |
| Total | 10,004 | 3,546 |
The 34 in the fatal row matches the 34 deaths the Crash Facts table prints for the county that year. The profile also gives pedestrian, bicycle and motorcycle totals.
| Crash type in the 2024 profile | Crashes | Injuries |
|---|---|---|
| Pedestrian | 136 | 146 |
| Bicycle | 28 | 26 |
| Motorcycle | 85 | 68 |
The same profile carries five years of county totals. Its fatal row matches the deaths the Crash Facts trend table prints for each of those years, which ties each column to its year.
| Year | Reportable crashes, Durham County | Injuries counted |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 8,147 | 3,289 |
| 2021 | 9,576 | 3,707 |
| 2022 | 10,146 | 3,875 |
| 2023 | 10,015 | 3,778 |
| 2024 | 10,004 | 3,546 |
| 5 Year Avg., as printed | 9,577.6 | 3,639.0 |
County crashes climbed after 2020 and held near the same level from 2022 through 2024. That is a fact about the county. It says nothing about the intersection where you were hit.
A motorcycle crash raises its own questions about the rider, and I take those up on the motorcycle accident page.
04
Why Durham's city row and the county profile give different counts
Durham's city row and the Durham County profile come from two different state publications, and neither prints how it places a crash in a city or a county. The city table in the Crash Facts carries no note at all.
The NCDMV city table
Durham's line shows 8,355 crashes. Nothing printed with the table says whether crashes in the Wake and Orange sections of Durham are included.
2024 Durham County Crash Profile
NCDOT counts 10,004 reportable crashes for Durham County alone, so a crash in Durham's Wake or Orange sections falls outside it.
Subtracting one count from the other would produce a number neither table supports, because two different state publications are not halves of one total.
No 2025 edition appears on the NCDMV's Crash Facts Archive, whose newest download is the 2024 edition. Anyone who wants the 2025 report can email operations-support@ncdot.gov, the address the NCDMV gives for it on its Crash Facts page.
05
Durham County school bus crashes in 2024
Page 24 of the 2024 edition holds the school bus table, and Durham County's row there reads 44 crashes, 1 fatality and 39 injuries for 2024.
| County | Crashes | Fatalities | Injuries |
|---|---|---|---|
| Durham | 44 | 1 | 39 |
No definition of what qualifies comes printed with that table. It also leaves out who was driving each vehicle and which one caused the crash.
When a Durham school bus crash hurt your child, the first questions are who was driving each vehicle and who owns the bus.
06
A Durham crash count against the facts of your own crash
A Durham crash statistic describes thousands of crashes and none of them in detail. The facts that matter in a claim come from your own crash, starting with the report an officer writes within 24 hours under G.S. 20-166.1(e).
The facts that matter in a claim come from your own crash.
A crash table is worth reading for what it counts and for what it leaves out. A table of Durham crashes counts events by the thousand, and your claim concerns one of them. To me, the report and the medical records from that one crash matter more than any county total.
Getting that report from Durham police, Duke University Police or the NCDMV is covered step by step on the Durham crash report page.
Questions
Common questions
Are interstate crashes inside Durham part of the city's 2024 count?
Nobody can tell from the NCDMV's city table alone. Durham's row carries no printed explanation of how the table places crashes in cities, so whether interstate crashes within Durham's limits sit inside the 8,355 is a question the 2024 edition does not answer.
Is a 2025 Crash Facts edition out for Durham yet?
Per the NCDMV's Crash Facts page, the 2025 report goes to anyone who emails operations-support@ncdot.gov for it. Editions posted for download stop at 2024, which is why the Durham figures here come from that edition.
Does a high Durham crash count make my claim stronger?
No. A city's crash total says nothing about how your crash happened or who caused it. A claim turns on the evidence from your own crash, beginning with the officer's report and your medical records.
About the attorney
Julian Doby, attorney since 1998
Julian Doby has been admitted to practice in North Carolina since 1998, North Carolina State Bar No. 25407, and he represents injured people across the state. His one office is at 110 W. Elm Street in Graham. He meets clients across the state after a first conversation by phone or video.
More about JulianSources and verification (5)
- NCDMV, North Carolina 2024 Traffic Crash Facts, City Crash Data (Section 4, Durham row on page 28), verified October 18, 2026.
- NCDOT, 2024 Durham County Crash Profile, Crash Data and Information, verified October 18, 2026.
- NCDMV, Crash Facts page (2025 report by email request), verified October 18, 2026.
- NCDMV, Crash Facts Archive, verified October 18, 2026.
- N.C. Gen. Stat. 20-166.1(a), (e) and (i), ncleg.gov, verified October 18, 2026.
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