News of the Week 10-15-18

The National Safety Council reports that cell phone use while driving leads to 1.6 million crashes each year. Nearly 390,000 injuries occur each year from accidents caused by texting while driving. 1 out of every 4 car accidents in the United States is caused by texting and driving.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, texting behind the wheel takes a driver's eye off the road for an average of 4.6 seconds, which is the time it takes to go from one end zone to the other. ... In that same survey, more than 90 percent of drivers know texting while driving is dangerous.

Five years ago, Newsday reported that texting and driving usurped drinking and driving as the number one killer of teens behind the wheel. While parents of new drivers know about the dangers of distracted driving, the smartphone has remained one of the biggest dangers among new drivers. According to the Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, distracted driving is the culprit behind nine percent of the fatal crashes among the 15-19 age group. In 2015, distracted driving killed more than 3,000 individuals—or about 9 people each day.

Law Enforcement is starting to take note and police departments are getting creative in attempting to curb this dangerous trend. State police in Chattanooga, Tennessee, have been known to patrol in a tractor-trailer so they can sit up high and spot drivers texting behind the wheel. In Bethesda, Maryland, a police officer disguised himself as a homeless man, stood near a busy intersection and radioed ahead to officers down the road about texting drivers. And in West Bridgewater, Massachusetts, south of Boston, an officer regularly tools around town on his bicycle, pedals up to drivers at stoplights and hands them $105 tickets.

In New York, texting tickets soared from about 9,000 in 2011 to nearly 85,000 in 2015. In Massachusetts, they rocketed from about 1,100 to a little over 6,100 over the same period. In California, the number of people found guilty of texting while driving climbed from under 3,000 in 2009 to over 31,000 in 2015.

The auto insurance industry has taken note. Some companies have begun to surcharge premiums for those with cell phone violations the same as they would for a DUI. For many drivers that could mean an increase in premium of hundreds of dollars for a period of 3 to 5 years.

Anyway you look at it – texting while driving is a BAD BET.

*Material for this blog was obtained from various online sources