Why Death Valley Has Killed So Many Drivers

It was late afternoon on December thirtieth, 2019, on Highway 190, the paved road that runs east of Stovepipe Wells through Death Valley. The sky was clear. The pavement was dry. Two cars moved toward each other on an open, ordinary stretch of desert road. Then one of them, a Kia, eased across the center line. No swerve. No sound of alarm. Xiaomin Deng, coming the other way in a Chevrolet Malibu, tried to move clear. There was nowhere to go. Five people were hurt, two of them airlifted out. And nobody could ever say why the car had drifted.