December marks the kickoff of National Drinking and Drugged Driving Awareness Month. 

According to the New York state Department of Motor Vehicles, alcohol involvement was the No. 1 contributing factor to car accidents this year. 

Driving fatalities are up 18% since last year, with most of those crashes attributed to drivers under the influence, according to Robert Sinclair of AAA. 

In the Bronx alone, traffic fatalities made a huge leap from 242 fatalities in 2020 to 266 this year, according to the NYPD. 

Sinclair says that last year, 36% of all car crashes that happened on New Year’s Eve involved drunk drivers. 

"With all of these ridesharing services and with many of them offering free rides and vouchers and all that, there is no excuse to drive drunk. You could kill somebody or yourself so it's really not worth it,” said Sinclair.