“Torontohenge,” when the setting sun aligns with Toronto’s east-west street grid and forces drivers to squint through salt-crusted windshields, coincides with the third-worst day of the year for car accidents, data shows.
The sun aligns with Toronto’s street grid twice a year: sunset on February 21 and October 22.
Global News obtained 11 years of collision data from the City of Toronto under access-to-information laws.
The fall Torontohenge, at a time when the sun sets at 6:24 p.m., doesn’t see an unusual number of accidents.
But the February Torontohenge – with sunset before 6 p.m. and winter grime on windshields blinding drivers – is a different story. Feb. 22 has an average of 172 property-damage accidents, the highest number until mid-December and the third-worst in the year.
This story has been corrected to eliminate dawn Torontohenges.
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