The Chula Vista Police Department arrested two drivers suspected of driving under the influence on Friday at a checkpoint.
Officers established a checkpoint in the 1000 block of Third Avenue between 6 p.m. and midnight, and of 1,898 vehicles that passed through, 789 were screened, and three drivers were given field sobriety tests, the CVPD announced on Saturday.
According to officers, citations were issued to 18 motorists for being unlicensed or having suspended licenses.
Three vehicles were impounded.
A grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety funded the checkpoint.
Last December, prosecutors in San Diego and six other California counties warned Wednesday that they are seeing a rapid rise in deadly DUI crashes. State-wide data showed that the traffic fatalities jumped 15 percent comparing the most recent statistics for October 2021 to a year prior, though not all were linked to impaired driving.
According to a report by the U.S Department of Transportation, nearly 32,000 people died in traffic collisions in 2021, and of those, about 3,200 of those were in California.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in an early estimate reports 31,720 people that died in traffic crashes from January to September of 2021. Compared to the same time frame in 2020, that is a 12 percent increase and the highest number of fatalities in the first nine months of any year since 2006.
In response to these numbers, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced a National Roadway Safety Strategy in hopes of preventing death and injury.
