MACON, Ga. — It may be deer hunting season, but it's also deer collision season.
It's mating season and time changes largely contribute to the increase in accidents in the fall and winter months.
Jimmy Thwaite drove down I-75 at one in the morning coming back home from a three day trip. But, what happened that night is more common than you might think.
"I reached down to change the radio station or something and all of a sudden there's just ram, and I went 'woah, did I hit something? What was that? Was there something in the road, or?'" Thwaite said.
State Farm found that in Georgia, drivers have a 1 in 83 chance of hitting a deer.
“When I tried to open my door, it wouldn't open. The impact was that hard that it jammed the front of the car up. I had to really push the door to get it open. As soon as I got out, I could smell it. I knew what it was,” Thwaite said.
Trooper Teipel, owner of Trooper’s Car Collision in Macon, says he gets a lot of customers during this time of the year.
He has recommendations for what to do to prevent a collision.
"Foremost slow down, don't swerve. Go ahead, as I hate to say it, go ahead and hit the deer because you don't want to go off the road and hit a big fat Georgia pine," he said.
Teipel says the main increase in deer accidents corresponds with mating season. He says if you see one, expect one or more coming right behind it.
If you do hit one, Teipel says, ease over to the side of the road and make sure you contact your body shop.
"Ease over to the side of the road get out and check your passengers. Get out and check your car, make sure you're not leaking anything. Because they can most likely, a lot of times they do puncture your radiator you don't want to drive it like that, contact your body shop," said Teipel.
Another reason we see more deer during this season is because of the time change.
As we “fall back” for daylight saving time, our days become shorter and nights become longer. Rush hour for most commuters tends to fall during the same hours in which white-tailed deer are most active – dawn and dusk.
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