What the Data Shows

Cottonwood County, Minnesota recorded 12 total road fatalities across 11 reported crashes during the 2017-2022 reporting window, according to NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System. The most recent year covered by the data logged 0 deaths on county roads, and the annual average works out to approximately 1.3 fatalities per year. Adjusted for population, the fatality rate is 11.5 per 100,000 residents, which places it close to the national middle by that per-capita measure among the 3,137 U.S. counties in this dataset.

With a small recorded crash count (11), FARS does not publish an individual cause-code breakdown for Cottonwood County, so readers looking for contributing-factor data should use the Minnesota state page, which aggregates county-level case files into statewide totals. Either way, the underlying records are drawn from a census of fatal crashes, not a statistical sample, so the counts are actual deaths rather than estimates.

The directional trend for Cottonwood County is stable, meaning annual counts have stayed within a narrow band relative to the average. Residents, insurers, and policy analysts can use this baseline alongside population density, highway mile data, and rural-versus-urban road mix to judge whether Cottonwood County's 12-death total is proportionate to its exposure. All numbers are for research and informational use only.