Police detected more than 150 offences during a major road safety operation across Victoria’s west.
Operation West Connect saw highway patrol units swam major arterial roads across Western Victoria targeting high-risk driving behaviour.
It comes as 172 lives have been lost on the state’s roads so far this year, up from 139 at the same time last year. More than a quarter of deaths (27%) have occurred in Western Victoria.
Operation West Connect is an ongoing operation focused on detecting speeding, distracted and impaired drivers.
Sixty per cent of offences detected have been for speeding with 52 motorists detected travelling between 10km/h and 25km/h over the speed limit and 21 detected travelling more than 25km/h over the speed limit.
Police have conducted 481 preliminary breath tests, 69 preliminary oral fluid tests for drugs and intercepted 40 heavy vehicles for compliance checks.
The total 156 offences detected during Operation West Connect on Thursday 28 July included:
• 95 speeding offences;
• 14 unregistered vehicles;
• Five seatbelt offences;
• Three mobile phone offences;
• Three disqualified/suspended and unlicenced drivers;
• Two drug driving offences from 69 roadside drug tests;
• One drink driving offence from 481 preliminary breath tests; and
• One vehicle impoundment.
Operation West Connect will continue across Western Victoria – encompassing major arterial roads from Geelong, Bacchus Marsh, Bendigo and Echuca as far west as the SA Border, and from the Surf Coast, Warrnambool and Portland as far north as the NSW Border.
Quotes attributable to Western Region Road Policing Inspector, Justine Ryan:
“It’s alarming we continue to detect so many motorists speeding and even more concerning the majority were well above the speed limit.
“Sadly, a number of this year’s fatal collisions in regional Victoria have involved motorists travelling at higher speeds.
“The likelihood of being involved in a serious injury or fatal collision increases significantly if you speed, so we need drivers to slow down and adhere to the speed limits – they are in place to keep all road users safe.
“Operation West Connect will continue throughout Western Victoria and will see police enforcing across major arterials to drive down road trauma”.
