Coming off a record year in 2006 for highway fatalities, the Utah Highway Patrol is gearing up to make sure there isn't a repeat this Labor Day weekend.

An estimated 35 million Americans are expected to hit the road for the traditional last three-day weekend of the summer.

Starting on the Wednesday before the holiday weekend, 10 people were killed in 2006 on Utah's roads. Not one of those deaths, however, was due to drunken driving. Investigators said drowsy driving and other errors were to blame.

To make sure the same thing doesn't happen this year, the UHP is conducting a number of different enforcement operations.

Although impaired driving wasn't a factor in any Labor Day driving deaths last year, the UHP wants to keep that perfect record going with another saturation effort. Mothers Against Drunk Driving is once again teaming up with the UHP for extra DUI enforcement over the weekend. Friday afternoon, the Utah Auto Dealers Association donated $5,000 to help pay for overtime DUI shifts.

Col. Lance Davenport, superintendent for the UHP, said there are typically more accidents during the Labor Day weekend because of the simple fact there are many more cars on the road.

In Utah, there is a crash every four hours involving a driver who is impaired either through drugs or alcohol, Davenport said. There is a fatality in Utah due to impaired driving an average of once every eight days, he said. In addition to DUI saturation shifts, troopers in different counties will give special attention to other problems typically seen on the road.

• Box Elder and Cache counties will have special speed enforcement crews patrolling the highways.

• Sanpete and Sevier counties are focusing primarily on I-70 enforcement.

• Washington and Iron counties will have DUI checkpoints.

• Summit and Wasatch counties will concentrate on seat-belt and speed enforcement.

• Tooele County troopers will be holding speed enforcement saturations.

In 2005 and 2004 there were only three reported deaths on Utah's roads during the Labor Day holiday weekend, and six in 2003.

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