After a crash in Warren County, New Jersey

How many crashes happen in Warren County, and how many hurt someone?

Police logged 3,093 crashes in Warren County in 2024, the last complete year. 666 of them, about 1.8 a day, hurt or killed at least one person. They injured 921 people and killed 15. Preliminary 2025 records show the same picture: 3,158 crashes, 638 with someone hurt or killed, and 10 deaths.

The two most common injury crashes in 2023 and 2024 were cars leaving the road and hitting a fixed object (1,078 crashes, 241 with injuries) and rear-end crashes (912 crashes, 241 with injuries). Fixed-object crashes are the rural Warren pattern: a tree, a pole, a guardrail or a ditch, often with no second driver to claim against. That matters later when you work out who pays.

Oxford is small, but look at the last column: 23 of its 33 crashes in 2024 were on Route 31. In Washington Township, Route 31 carried 78 of 179. In Mansfield, Route 57 carried more than half. Out here one road usually is the crash map.

Which Warren County roads and hours are the most dangerous?

I-80 has the most crashes, but Route 31 is where a crash is most likely to hurt someone. Nearly a third of Route 31 crashes in Warren County in 2023 and 2024 injured or killed someone, against about 18 percent on I-80.

The only fatal Route 31 crash in Warren in those two years was a head-on in Oxford Township, in daylight, on a wet, downhill right-hand curve.

What time of day are crashes worst?

For injury crashes, the afternoon. The 3 pm to 6 pm window held 249 of Warren's 1,010 injury crashes in 2023 and 2024, a quarter of the total, with 5 pm to 6 pm the single worst hour (95). Friday was the worst day (163).

For deaths, darkness on unlit roads stands out. Crashes on dark roads with no street lights were 15 percent of Warren's crashes in 2023 and 2024 but 7 of the 26 deaths, more than a quarter.

When do deer crashes peak in Warren County?

October and November, after dark. 307 of Warren's 774 police-logged animal crashes in 2023 and 2024 came in those two months, and October was the single worst month (157). In the fall, 68 percent happened in the dark, and 6 pm to 7 pm was the worst hour, with 41 crashes.

The evening spike is sharper here than statewide. From 5 pm to 8 pm, Warren's share of fall animal crashes is 31.9 percent, against 28 percent for New Jersey. There is a smaller morning peak at 6 am (29 crashes), during the morning commute.

Daylight saving time makes it worse in a predictable way. On the Monday after the clocks fell back, Warren logged 5 animal crashes in 2023 and 6 in 2024, more than twice the average fall day of 2.5. The commute home moves into the dark right in the middle of the rut. In 2026 the clocks fell back on 1 November, so this guide is published in the worst stretch of the year.

Is it getting worse?

Yes. Warren logged 366 animal crashes in 2023, 408 in 2024 and 471 in preliminary 2025, a 15 percent rise in a single year and the second biggest rise of New Jersey's 21 counties. In 2024 alone, 408 of 3,093 crashes involved an animal, 13 percent. Statewide the figure is about 4 percent.

Which towns and roads?

In Blairstown and Liberty, one crash in three involves an animal. In Phillipsburg it is fewer than 1 in 100. The full county breakdown, with every New Jersey county for comparison, is in our deer crash numbers for every NJ county.

On Route 31 the deer crashes cluster in Washington Township (35 of them in two years) and Oxford Township (7). The good news: animal crashes rarely hurt people. Only 28 of Warren's 774 (3.6 percent) injured or killed anyone, against 22 percent of all New Jersey crashes. The bad news is that the dangerous ones are usually the swerve, not the hit.

Who responds after a crash in rural Warren County?

A 911 call in Warren County goes to the Warren County Communications Center, which dispatches for 14 law enforcement agencies, 21 fire agencies and 12 EMS agencies. Which police agency comes depends on the town, and on the road.

The State Police are the local police in much of the county. Troop B runs the Hope, Washington and Perryville stations that cover Warren. In 2024, 1,176 of Warren's 3,093 crash reports, 38 percent, named a State Police station. On I-80 and I-78 it is the State Police even in towns that have their own department, which is why Greenwich Township (I-78) shows more State Police reports than local ones.

Two practical points. First, Oxford has no police department of its own: the township's own directory sends police business to Washington Township Police, so an Oxford crash report comes from that department, not from a State Police station. Second, in State Police towns the trooper comes from a station that may be in another town, so you may wait. Use the time to take photos.

Who brings the ambulance?

Warren's 12 EMS agencies are mostly local squads: volunteer ambulance corps, emergency squads and fire-department EMS divisions, each covering a set of towns. Some towns are covered by a squad based in the next town over. You do not choose the squad. If an ambulance bill arrives later, send it to your PIP insurer with your claim number, like any other medical bill.

Which hospital will you end up in?

The two hospitals inside the county are:

• St. Luke's Warren Campus, 185 Roseberry Street, Phillipsburg (part of the St. Luke's University Health Network), with a 24-hour emergency department.
• Hackettstown Medical Center, 651 Willow Grove Street, Hackettstown (part of Atlantic Health), open 24 hours with emergency care.

The crew decides where to take you based on your injuries and where you are, and the most seriously hurt may go further. Write down which hospital you went to and when. You will need it for the PIP claim, and the hospital record is often the first written note of your injuries.

What should you do at the scene before the police leave?

Almost everyone gets a police officer. Almost no one gets what they need from the scene. In our intake data from 584 injury calls to a New Jersey injury firm (2023 to 2026), 89 percent had police at the scene. But 36 percent did not know whether the other driver was insured, and only 28 percent had contact details for a witness.

1. Ask the officer which agency and which station or department they are from, and for the case number. In Warren that answer decides where you get the report.
2. Photograph the other driver's insurance card, not just their name. A photo settles the "was the other driver insured?" question you will otherwise be asking for months.
3. Get one witness name and number. On a rural road the witness is often the driver who stopped behind you, and they leave first.
4. For a deer, photograph the animal, the damage and the road (the mile marker or nearest crossroad). That is your proof it was an animal and not a collision with something else.
5. Note the light and the time. Dusk on an unlit road is the textbook Warren deer crash, and the police report records light conditions.

How do you get your Warren County crash report (NJTR-1)?

The police crash report in New Jersey is the NJTR-1. Where you request it depends on who wrote it, which is why the table above matters.

If the State Police wrote it (Hope, Washington or Perryville station)

Order it online through the State Police and Turnpike Authority crash report portal. You can search by case number, license plate or driver's license number. A non-toll road report costs $13. The State Police say it can take up to 14 business days to be ready, and reports are kept for six years from the year of the crash. If the search says the report is not available yet, it has not been approved; try again in a few days.

If a local department wrote it

Phillipsburg, Hackettstown, Washington Township (including Oxford), Lopatcong, Mansfield, Independence, Greenwich, Pohatcong, Belvidere and Blairstown departments issue their own reports. Call the department's records desk with the date, location and case number, or use our crash report finder, which matches every NJ town to the agency that usually writes its reports. What to check once you have it is in our guide to getting and reading a New Jersey accident report.

If no officer came

You still may have to report it. New Jersey law requires a driver in a crash that injures or kills anyone, or causes more than $500 of damage to any one person's property, to notify the local, county or State Police by the quickest means. After a deer strike, $500 of damage is one headlight and a fender. If police did not investigate, NJDOT's SR-1 self-reporting form is the only form for that situation. It can be filed online, and NJDOT says the receipt can go to your insurance company.

Who pays after you hit a deer in New Jersey?

Your own insurance, in two separate pieces: one for the car and one for your body.

Comprehensive versus collision. New Jersey's Department of Banking and Insurance describes collision coverage as paying for damage from a collision with another car or object, and comprehensive as paying for damage not caused by a collision, adding that it will pay if you collide with an animal. So the deer itself is a comprehensive claim, and avoiding the deer and hitting something else is a collision claim. Both are optional. On the Standard Policy the standard deductible is $750; on the Basic Policy insurers are not required to offer them at all. If you dropped comprehensive to save money on an older car, the deer damage is yours.

PIP for injuries. Personal Injury Protection pays your medical expenses no matter who caused the crash, and a deer has no insurer. PIP also covers things like lost wages and help at home. Standard Policy PIP runs from $15,000 up to $250,000 or more, and you pay a 20 percent co-payment on bills between your deductible and $5,000. Our explainer on what to do, when to report it and who pays after you hit a deer in NJ covers the swerve scenarios in more detail.

Swerved into another car? New Jersey uses comparative negligence. You can recover from the other driver only if your share of fault is not greater than theirs, and your damages are cut by your share. In our intake data, 25 percent of callers believed they were at fault and 32 percent were unsure, so this is where many deer-season claims get stuck.

How long do you have after a Warren County crash?

Two years from the crash to file an injury lawsuit in New Jersey, under N.J.S.A. 2A:14-2. People wait far too long. In our intake data, the median caller waited 156 days to make a first call, 25 percent called within 30 days, and 18 percent called more than two years after the crash. The most common reason a firm turned a caller down was that the two-year deadline had already passed.

Questions people ask after a Warren County crash

Sources and method

Crash counts are our own analysis of NJDOT crash records for 2023, 2024 and preliminary 2025 (2023 from the per-table archive, 2024 and 2025 from the NJDOT crash data portal, fatal crashes supplemented from the State Police feed). Counts, not rates. They say nothing about fault or claims. "Hurt or killed" means a crash with at least one person injured or killed. Intake figures are anonymised aggregates from 584 injury intake records forwarded to a New Jersey injury firm, 2023 to 2026, known to the publisher. Survivor stories come from coded posts in a car-accident survivors' support group, shared with members' consent, paraphrased, with first initials only.

1. Warren County Department of Public Safety, Communications Center agency list (police, fire and EMS by town): warrencountynjdps.com
2. New Jersey State Police, Troop B road stations: njsp.njoag.gov
3. Oxford Township directory (police: Washington Township): oxfordtwpnj.org
4. NJSP and Turnpike Authority crash report requests, fees and timing: njportal.com/njsp/crashreports
5. N.J.S.A. 39:4-130, duty to report a crash: Justia (archived)
6. NJDOT SR-1 self-reporting crash form: NJDOT (archived)
7. NJ Department of Banking and Insurance, Auto Insurance Buyer's Guide 2026 (comprehensive, collision, PIP, deductibles): nj.gov/dobi
8. N.J.S.A. 2A:15-5.1, comparative negligence: Justia (archived)
9. N.J.S.A. 2A:14-2, two-year limit for injury actions: Justia (archived)
10. St. Luke's Warren Campus: slhn.org. Hackettstown Medical Center: atlantichealth.org
11. Warren County animal crash data (towns, roads, fall hours): CSV