Fatal car crashes in Odessa, TX: deadliest roads, 2020-2024

From 2020 through 2024, federal crash records list 101 fatal crashes inside Odessa, in which 114 people died. The roads with the most were I-20 with 17 fatal crashes, State Route 191 with 14 and US-385 with 8.

Filing deadline, fault rule, insurance and the court for a crash in Odessa: Odessa, TX injury guide.

NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), the federal census of fatal traffic crashes, places 101 fatal crashes inside Odessa from 2020 through 2024, and 114 people died in them. The years 2020 to 2023 come from NHTSA's Final Files. The 2024 counts come from its Annual Report File, the first release for that year, so they may be revised when the final version appears. A crash is counted once however many people it killed, which is why the crash and death totals differ.

The yearly totals swung widely. Odessa recorded 27 fatal crashes and 31 deaths in 2020, the highest of the five years, then 15 crashes and 19 deaths in 2021, 20 crashes and 21 deaths in 2022 and 14 crashes and 17 deaths in 2023. In 2024 the count climbed back to 25 crashes and 26 deaths, 11 more crashes than the year before.

Across Ector County, the same records show 207 fatal crashes and 239 deaths over the five years, so Odessa accounts for 49 percent of the county's fatal crashes and 48 percent of its deaths. Odessa's 114 deaths are the 11th highest among the 509 Texas places with fatal crashes in these records, a list led by Houston with 1,582 deaths, Dallas with 1,112 and San Antonio with 917.

Three numbered routes top Odessa's list. I-20 leads with 17 fatal crashes and 17 deaths. State Route 191 is second with 14 crashes and 15 deaths, and US-385 third with 8 crashes and 8 deaths. Together those three roads account for 39 of the city's 101 fatal crashes and 40 of its 114 deaths, and each had a fatal crash as recently as 2024.

The rest of the list is mostly named streets. 8th St had 6 fatal crashes and 6 deaths. Grandview Ave had 5 crashes that killed 8 people, the widest gap between crashes and deaths of any road on the list. State Route 338 had 5 crashes and 6 deaths, and Loop (State Route 338) had 2 crashes and 3 deaths. 22nd St and Faudree Rd had 2 fatal crashes and 3 deaths each, and 52nd St had 2 crashes and 2 deaths.

A road's count shows where fatal crashes were recorded, not why any one of them happened or who was at fault. For a person hurt on I-20, State Route 191 or any street in the city, the claim depends on that crash's own evidence: the officer's report, the damage to the vehicles, witness statements and any video. The table on this page lists the top ten roads with two or more fatal crashes, with deaths and the latest year for each.

Night was the deadliest time. Of the 101 crashes, 65 happened after dark: 39 on roads with lighting, 24 on roads without it and 2 where the lighting was unknown. Another 33 happened in daylight, 2 at dawn and 1 in conditions reported as unknown. By the clock, the hours from midnight to 6 a.m. and from 6 p.m. to midnight had 33 fatal crashes each, so 66 of the 101 happened between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m.

Friday had 23 fatal crashes, more than any other day; Saturday had 16, Sunday and Tuesday 15 each, Wednesday 14, Thursday 10 and Monday 8. Weather was clear in 92 crashes, cloudy in 7 and rainy in 2. Four crashes happened in a construction work zone. As for the vehicles, 43 crashes involved one, 43 involved two and 15 involved three or more.

In 52 crashes the first harmful event was not a collision with another vehicle in traffic: a pedestrian was struck in 22, and most of the rest involved a fixed object such as a fence, a pole or a signal support, or a rollover. Among collisions between vehicles, 23 were angle crashes, in which the front of one vehicle strikes the side of another, 16 were head-on and 9 were rear-end. By location, 56 happened away from any junction and 31 at or related to an intersection.

Drivers were the largest group of the dead. Of the 114 people killed in Odessa from 2020 through 2024, 74 were drivers, 13 were passengers and 2 were vehicle occupants whose role as driver or passenger is unknown. Of those 89 occupants, 15 were riding a motorcycle or moped, which makes motorcyclists 13 percent of all deaths in the city.

Outside vehicles, 23 pedestrians were killed, 20 percent of the total, and 2 people were on personal conveyances, a FARS category kept separate from pedestrians and cyclists. In all, 24 of the 101 crashes involved a pedestrian, cyclist or other person outside a vehicle. For each family, what can be recovered depends on who caused that crash and what coverage applies.

This example is hypothetical; the numbers are round and only show how the rules work. Suppose a driver is hit broadside at an Odessa intersection on a Friday night by a driver who entered against a red light. That is an angle crash, the most common type of collision between vehicles in Odessa's data. The injured driver's medical bills come to $45,000 and lost pay to $15,000, $60,000 in total. The other insurer accepts that its driver ran the light but says the injured driver was speeding and assigns 30 percent of the fault.

Texas uses modified comparative negligence (51% bar). Under that rule, a driver found 50 percent or less at fault still recovers, but the award drops by his or her share, and past 50 percent nothing is paid. At 30 percent, the $60,000 becomes $42,000. If the insurer could push the share above 50 percent, the recovery would be zero, which is why evidence about speed, signal timing and lighting carries so much weight in a night crash.

Texas is an at-fault state, so the other driver's liability insurance is the primary source of payment, and Texas requires drivers to carry at least 30/60/25 in liability coverage. That minimum pays no more than $30,000 for one injured person, $60,000 for all injuries in a crash and $25,000 for property damage. Here, a minimum policy would cover $30,000 of the $42,000, and whether any other coverage reaches the rest is something an attorney would check.

Texas law puts the reporting duty on the driver. Under Tex. Transp. Code § 550.026, the driver in a collision that injures or kills anyone, or damages a vehicle so that it cannot be driven normally and safely, must report it immediately by the quickest means of communication; inside a city such as Odessa, that report goes to the local police. Drivers no longer file a form of their own: TxDOT stopped taking the driver's report (CR-2) after September 1, 2017, and the officer files the crash report (CR-3) with TxDOT within 10 days.

• Call 911 from the scene if anyone is hurt, and write down which police agency responded and the report number.
• Once the officer's report is filed, buy a copy through TxDOT's Crash Report Online Purchase System.
• If it is safe, photograph the vehicles, the signals and the lighting before anything is moved; 65 of Odessa's 101 fatal crashes happened after dark, and night conditions are hard to reconstruct later.
• Get the other driver's name, insurer and policy number, then see a doctor the same day; save the bills and records from every visit.
• Be careful in recorded statements to the other driver's insurer, since any share of fault assigned to you reduces the claim and a share above 50 percent ends it.
• Keep the crash date in view: in Texas the two-year clock for a lawsuit generally starts on the day of the injury.

A lawsuit over a crash in Odessa is typically filed in the Ector County District Court, though some cases belong in another county or in federal court. Most injury claims settle without a trial, but the filing deadline sets the outer limit for every negotiation. Texas generally gives an injured person two years from the date of injury to file a personal injury lawsuit (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003). A claim that has neither settled nor been filed by then is generally lost, however clear the other driver's fault.

Because every crash in this data killed someone, the wrongful death rule matters as much as the injury rule. A family's wrongful death claim in Texas generally has two years from the date of death (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(b)). If a city, county or state vehicle or employee was involved, the claim against that government body runs on a much shorter clock: 6 months, and some city charters are shorter (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 101.101).

Everything above follows Texas rules, and the answer can change across a state line. Texas bars recovery only for a person found more than 50 percent at fault. Alabama, Maryland, North Carolina and Virginia use contributory negligence, a stricter rule under which an injured person found even slightly at fault is generally barred from recovering. In those states, the 30 percent share in the example above could end the claim instead of reducing it.

Insurance systems and deadlines differ too. Texas is an at-fault state, where the at-fault driver's liability insurer pays, while Florida, Michigan, New York and New Jersey are no-fault states, where an injured person's own policy pays certain losses first regardless of fault. Tennessee has a one-year deadline for most injury claims. For a crash on the job, Texas workers' compensation generally adds its own clock: notice to the employer within 30 days and a claim within one year, handled by the Texas Division of Workers' Compensation.

The FARS counts on this page cannot show who caused a particular Odessa crash, how badly a survivor was hurt or what insurance applies, and those are the facts that decide a claim. Most personal injury attorneys work on contingency, and an attorney must evaluate the facts before anyone can say whether a claim exists or what it might be worth. Fee terms should be confirmed in writing before anyone is hired.

Ask Legal Matters is a personal injury lead-generation service that collects free case review requests from injured people in the United States and shares them with independent attorneys and law firms. It is not a law firm and does not give legal advice. Requests may be shared with independent attorneys and legal services partners who handle inquiries in Texas. If you or a family member was hurt on I-20, State Route 191 or any other road in Odessa, you can request a free case review.

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More on this type of claim: Car accidents: evidence, deadlines and when to ask an attorney.

• Odessa, Texas: local injury guide, court and deadlines
• Car Accident Claims in the United States: The Complete Guide
• Wrongful Death Claims: Who Can File, Deadlines and Damages

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