Despite flurry of holiday traffic deaths, fatal accidents in 2000 were much lower

Tuesday, January 2nd 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

(AP)- Despite six deaths on Oklahoma roads during the final three days of 2000, there were 100 fewer fatal accidents during the year than there were in 1999, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol reported.

As of Monday, there were 640 deaths reported in the state for 2000 compared with 747 deaths in 1999, patrol Lt. Chris West said.

``We've seen a significant downward trend in recent years in the number of fatalities so we contribute it to more people wearing seat belts. We also think people are doing a better job driving because there are more and more drivers now,'' West said.

But slippery conditions following two holiday storms in Oklahoma resulted in numerous wrecks _ several of them fatal _ in the past week.

The latest occurred Monday morning when a Vian man was killed when the pickup he was driving lost control on Interstate 40 in Sequoyah County and was hit by a semi-trailer, authorities said.

Hayden Barnoski, 54, was thrown from the van and pronounced dead at the scene of the 9 a.m. accident, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol said.

Barnoski's son, Lance Barnoski, 28, was a passenger in the pickup and was listed in stable condition with arm and leg injuries. The driver of the semi-trailer was not injured.

On Sunday, William Hoyman Davidson and Ila Ruth Davidson, of Galena, Mo., were killed when their sports utility vehicle flipped off an Interstate 44 bridge in Tulsa County and plunged 50 feet into the Arkansas River bed below, authorities said.

William Davidson, 63, was trapped for about an hour in the wreckage before firefighters freed him, the patrol said.

He and Ila Davidson, 61, were both wearing seat belts, troopers reported.

In other accidents on Sunday a 4-year-old Arizona girl was killed around 9 a.m. when the passenger van in which she was riding careened out of control on an ice-covered road and overturned in the Oklahoma Panhandle, the patrol said.

And a 19-year-old North Richland Hills, Texas, woman was killed on I-35 in Love County when the car she was driving collided with a semi-trailer that was stopped on the shoulder of the road, troopers said