For the third consecutive year there is a decline in the number of traffic fatalities on Missouri’s roads.

The State Highway Patrol’s Captain Tim Hull says the total number of deaths in 2008 was 941, down from 992 in 2007, and from 1,096 in 2006. That represents a 13 percent decrease from 2005 to 2006, a nine percent drop from 2006 to 2007, and a five percent decline from 2007 to 2008.

Hull says there are several reasons for the decline, including stepped-up enforcement operations on the part of authorities. Those operations include sobriety checkpoints. Hull adds the Highway Patrol’s goal was to bring the annual accident death totals under a thousand by the end of 2008. It did so in 2007 and again last year.

Download/Listen: Missouri State Highway Patrol Captain Tim Hull (:24 MP3)