How Many People Die in Crashes Involving Lorries in Britain Each Year?

Quick answer: In 2024, 201 people were killed in collisions involving a heavy goods vehicle (HGV) in Great Britain, according to the Department for Transport (DfT). That is 7% more than in 2023, although 25% fewer than in 2014. Only 17 of the 201 were lorry occupants themselves; the rest were drivers, passengers, riders, cyclists and pedestrians in other vehicles or on foot.

The 2024 lorry toll

DfT counts a death as HGV-involved when a heavy goods vehicle was involved in the collision, whatever the victim was travelling in. That distinction matters, because the danger of a lorry crash falls mostly on other road users, not on the lorry's own occupants.

• 201 people killed in collisions involving an HGV in 2024, up 7% on 2023 and down 25% on 2014
• 17 HGV occupants killed in 2024, up 21% on 2023 and up 21% on 2014, from a small base
• 598 HGV occupants injured or killed in total in 2024, down 9% on 2023 and down 56% on 2014
• 1,602 people killed on Britain's roads in total in 2024, so HGV-involved collisions accounted for around one in eight deaths

The rise in 2024 goes against the overall trend, since total road deaths fell by 1% in 2024. A single year's move in a category of around 200 deaths should not be over-read.

Who dies in lorry crashes

Of the 201 deaths in HGV-involved collisions, 17 were HGV occupants, leaving 184 deaths among other road users. DfT's road user risk analysis adds an important detail: cars were the vehicle type most often involved in fatal collisions where other road users were killed, followed by HGVs. Per passenger mile, motorcyclists and HGVs had the highest rate of other road user deaths.

That finding is about exposure and physics rather than blame. A fully laden lorry weighs many times more than a car, stops over a longer distance and has larger blind spots, so when a collision happens, the outcome for the other party is more likely to be fatal. DfT's figures do not say who was at fault in these collisions, and this article does not claim otherwise. For wider context, deaths in collisions involving each vehicle type in 2024 were:

• 1,251 deaths in collisions involving a car
• 364 deaths in collisions involving a motorcycle
• 201 deaths in collisions involving an HGV
• 176 deaths in collisions involving a light goods vehicle
• 85 deaths in collisions involving a pedal cycle
• 45 deaths in collisions involving a bus or coach

These figures do not add up to the total of 1,602 deaths, because a single collision can involve more than one type of vehicle and be counted under each.

Where lorry deaths happen

DfT's headline report does not split HGV-involved deaths by road type, so this article does not claim a rural or urban split for lorries alone. Across all road users in 2024, 956 people were killed on rural roads, 60% of all deaths, while 555 were killed on urban roads and 91 on motorways.

For lorry occupants themselves, the fatality rate was 1.0 deaths per billion miles travelled in 2024, up 24% on 2023. That rate is low compared with motorcyclists at 115.2 per billion miles, pedestrians at 26.4 and pedal cyclists at 23.3, and lower even than car occupants at 2.7. The lorry driver's own risk is relatively low; the risk a lorry presents to everyone else is the larger part of the story.

What the trend means

Three points stand out. First, lorry-involved deaths rose while total deaths fell, a divergence worth watching in the next release rather than a verdict on its own. Second, the long-term direction since 2014 is still downward for HGV-involved deaths, 25% lower, even though HGV occupant deaths have risen over the same period from a small base. Third, HGV occupant casualties overall have fallen by 56% since 2014, which suggests lorry cabs have become safer for their occupants, even as the toll on other road users remains high.

None of this makes lorries uniquely dangerous in a moral sense; it makes them a priority for measures that protect other road users, such as better mirrors and cameras to cut blind spots, safer following distances and speed management where lorries mix with cars, cyclists and pedestrians. London's Direct Vision Standard, which requires HGVs over 12 tonnes to meet visibility standards or fit safety systems, is one example, and Transport for London has reported that deaths and serious injuries among people walking, cycling and motorcycling in collisions with HGVs in London fell by around half against its 2017 to 2019 baseline.

For local context, the UK road accidents by council area page breaks down police-reported collisions by local authority, and the latest accident reports page shows what is happening on the roads today. More data articles can be found on the articles page.

How these numbers were counted

All figures in this article come from the Department for Transport's Reported road casualties Great Britain, annual report: 2024 and its road user risk factsheet for 2024, based on police-reported collisions recorded through the STATS19 system. The figures are final estimates, published in September 2025. A death means a person who died within 30 days of a reported collision on a public road. The figures cover Great Britain, meaning England, Scotland and Wales, not Northern Ireland. A heavy goods vehicle is a goods vehicle over 3.5 tonnes; the London Direct Vision Standard figures are Transport for London's and apply to vehicles over 12 tonnes, so they are not directly comparable with the national figures.

Only collisions reported to the police are included, and slight injuries in particular are known to be under-reported. Figures for injured casualties are adjusted for changes in how some police forces record injury severity. Because a collision can involve several vehicle types, deaths by vehicle involved do not sum to the total death count.