This report combines data from two of our key crash databases, providing statistics on traffic crashes of all severities. NHTSAs mission is to reduce deaths, injuries, and economic losses from motor vehicle crashes. This past year we made major strides toward reaching these goals, as the Nations crash fatality rate per 100 million vehicle miles of travel in 2003 was the lowest (1.48) since record keeping began 29 years ago. It was the first time that the rate has dropped below 1.50. Yet, over 6.3 million police-reported motor vehicle crashes still occurred on our highways in 2003 one every 5 seconds. On average, a person was injured in these crashes every 11 seconds, and someone was killed every 12 minutes. Major campaigns to increase safety belt use and to reduce impaired driving, and the efforts of some State legislatures to pass more effective safety belt and drunk driving laws, were major contributors to the reduction of the fatality rate in 2003. Specifically, alcohol-related fatalities declined significantly in 2003, to 17,013, the first such decline in 6 years, as more States adopted laws that set the per se maximum blood alcohol concentration at 0.08. Additionally, there was a significant decline in the number of unbelted fatalities, reflecting increases in overall safety belt use. Unfortunately, 14,630 persons still were killed in crashes that involved a driver or nonoccupant with blood alcohol concentration of 0.08 or greater, and 56 percent of those killed in passenger vehicles were not wearing safety belts. This underscores the need for States to continue to aggressively enforce drunk-driving laws and for more States to adopt primary safety belt laws. During 2005, NHTSA will continue to keep our Nations highways among the safest in the world. We will focus our efforts on increasing safety belt use, reducing impaired driving, improving inter-vehicle compatibility, and reducing fatalities and injuries from rollover collisions. We will also continue working with our partners to improve the data systems that are the foundation for all these efforts. NHTSAs efforts in this important mission could not be accomplished without the dedicated efforts of States and localities throughout the country they collect, code, and report much of the information contained in this document. The dedication and hard work of the people involved throughout the data collection process has made NHTSAs crash data files the best source of crash data in the world. Special thanks are extended to the police officers who provide the life-saving services of clearing crash scenes and aiding the victims of crashes, as well as reporting information about the crash. The work you do in carefully collecting and recording the crash information that is embodied in this report also provides a life-saving service.