Fatal crash rate in Meade County, South Dakota

Fatal crashes recorded by NHTSA in Meade County, South Dakota, 2020 to 2024, divided by the people who live there. Fatal crashes only: not injuries, not all crashes, not traffic in general.

Meade County, South Dakota2024 · fatal crashes recorded by NHTSA

22.7fatal crashes per 100,000 residents in 2024

In 2024, NHTSA recorded 7 fatal crashes in Meade County, South Dakota, where 30,875 people lived. That is 22.7 fatal crashes for every 100,000 residents, and 7 people died in those crashes. Over 2020 to 2024 the average was 15.1.

010203040

South Dakota 14.5

US 10.7

Meade County 22.7

The road is a scale of fatal crashes per 100,000 residents in 2024, 0 to 40. The yellow post is Meade County; the white posts are South Dakota and the United States.

Per 100,000: 7 fatal crashes ÷ 30,875 residents × 100,000 = 22.7
Five-year: 23 crashes (2020 to 2024) ÷ 152,647 resident-years × 100,000 = 15.1
Same year: South Dakota: 134 ÷ 927,110 = 14.5 · United States: 36,297 ÷ 340,003,797 = 10.7

Every year, 2020 to 2024

US 10.7

13.4

9.9

13.0

16.2

22.7

20202021202220232024

Bars: this place, fatal crashes per 100,000 residents. Dashed line: the United States in the latest year. Source: NHTSA FARS and Census population estimates, each year.

Year	Fatal crashes	Deaths	Population	Per 100,000
2020	4	4	29,897	13.4
2021	3	3	30,289	9.9
2022	4	4	30,663	13.0
2023	5	5	30,923	16.2
2024	7	7	30,875	22.7

2024 is NHTSA’s Annual Report File and will be revised when the final file replaces it. Populations are July 1 estimates, Census Vintage 2025.

What the record says about those crashes, 2020 to 2024

Every figure is a count of the 23 fatal crashes NHTSA coded to Meade County, South Dakota over five years, from the fields FARS records. Nothing is estimated or inferred.

Road type	Crashes	Share
Interstate	9	39%
Other freeway or expressway	0	0%
Other principal arterial	7	30%
Minor arterial	0	0%
Major collector	4	17%
Minor collector	0	0%
Local road	3	13%
Unknown or not reported	0	0%
Rural	19	83%
Urban	4	17%

Time of day	Crashes	Share
Midnight to 5:59 am	0	0%
6 am to 11:59 am	13	57%
Noon to 5:59 pm	6	26%
6 pm to 11:59 pm	4	17%
Hour unknown	0	0%

Light	Crashes	Share
Daylight	20	87%
Dark, not lighted (or lighting unknown)	2	9%
Dark, lighted	0	0%
Dawn or dusk	1	4%
Unknown or not reported	0	0%

Weather	Crashes	Share
Clear	17	74%
Cloudy	2	9%
Rain	0	0%
Snow, sleet or freezing rain	2	9%
Fog, smog or smoke	2	9%
Severe wind, blowing sand or other	0	0%
Unknown or not reported	0	0%

Involving	Crashes	Share
A pedestrian	0	0%
A bicyclist or other cyclist	0	0%
A speeding-related vehicle	4	17%
A driver police reported as drinking	6	26%

Most-named roads	Crashes
I-90 W	6
SR-34	5
I-90 E	3
SR-79	2
CR-GALAXY PL	1

Road type is FARS FUNC_SYS; speeding is any vehicle coded SPEEDREL 2 to 5; drinking is any driver coded DRINKING = 1 (police-reported, not a blood-alcohol test). Road names are the trafficway strings as the police coded them, counted as written, so the same road can appear under two spellings.

How this is counted

Fatal crashes are rows in NHTSA’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) file FARS2024NationalCSV.zip, accident.csv, one row per crash on a public road in which someone died within 30 days. Deaths are the FATALS field. Counties are the FARS STATE and COUNTY codes joined to Census FIPS codes.
Population is the Census Bureau’s July 1 estimate for the same year, county totals, Vintage 2025. Rate per 100,000 = crashes ÷ population × 100,000.
The five-year average is total crashes over the years with both inputs ÷ total population over those years × 100,000, the rolling form in 23 CFR 490.207.
What it cannot say. FARS has no injury-only or property-damage crashes, no congestion, and nothing about any one driver, trip or road’s risk. A crash is counted where it happened, not where the people lived. Rates are not ranked here; comparing two places means comparing both sets of inputs.

Informational only, not professional advice. Last reviewed: October 2026. Data snapshot built 2026-10-28.