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Nearly 10% of Fatal Crashes Involved Distracted Driving

9/26/2012

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Distracted driving is a contributing factor in nearly 10% of all fatal crashes in 2010, while that number nearly doubles to 18% for crashes where individuals were injured, according to a report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The report studied all vehicle crashes in 2010.  NHTSA found that 416,000 people were injured that year in motor vehicle crashes that involved distracted drivers, while 3,092 peoople were killed in crashes where someone was exhibiting distracted driving behaviors.

Of the large truck drivers (like 18-wheelers) involved in fatal crashes, 5% were found to have been distracted, and 9% of those were distracted by their cell phones.  It is noteworthy that handheld use of cell phones is prohibited for truck drivers operating on interstate highways.

In comparison, 7% of the passenger car drivers in fatal crashes were found to have been distracted, and 14% of those were distracted by cell phones.

Cell phone usage was associated with 408 deaths (13% of total distracted driving fatalities) and 24,000 injuries (6% of those injured in distracted driving crashes).

Young people are more distracted than others.  Of drivers less than 20 years old involved in a fatal crash, 11% were found to be distracted at the time of the crash making this age group the largest of all distracted drivers involved in a fatal crash. About 19% of this group was distracted by cell phones.

You will find more Distracted Driving information on distraction.gov.   
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Teen Girls and distractions

4/25/2012

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A new study suggests that teen girls are far more likely than boys to engage in distracted driving behavior. "There's a remarkable difference between boys and girls when it comes to distracting driving habits. In almost every category we surveyed ... girls are more likely to engage in dangerous or distracting behaviors by almost 15%," said Angela Patterson of Bridgestone Americas, which conducted the study.

The overwhelming majority of teen girls who responded to the study said that changing music on car stereos and playing loud music while driving distracted them. Eighty-three percent of teen girls also told researchers that having more than one passenger in the vehicle caused them to lose focus on the road.

While the majority of teens admitted they are most likely to fidget with a radio while driving, they see it as less dangerous than other factors causing accidents. Teens perceive drunken driving, reading text messages and eating while driving, as well as having other passengers in the car, as the biggest distractions for drivers their age.

Only one-third of teens in the survey said they believe that talking on the phone while driving is "very dangerous." Twenty percent of teens admitted typing the occasional text message while driving.

Researchers suggest that for the most part, teens appear to be minimizing distractions while behind the wheel.

According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, 16-year-olds have higher crash rates than drivers of any other age. But there's a downward trend in teen fatalities on the nation's highways. More than 3,400 teens died in motor vehicle crashes in 2009, but that death toll is 60% percent less than in 1975, according to the safety group.

The full results of the study are posted on www.teensdrivesmart.com.

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Distracted Driving Awareness Month

4/24/2012

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April is National Distracted Driving Awareness Month and the traffic safety community has a simple message for drivers: One Text or Call could Wreck it All.

Are you aware that in California, where texting and talking on a hand-held cell phone while driving are against the law, road fatalities have fallen by 22 percent?

Closer to home, the Texas Department of Transportation is now encouraging drivers to refrain from engaging in non-driving activities while on the road, particularly cell phone use and texting. In its second year, TxDOT's Talk. Text. Crash. outreach campaign is designed to raise awareness of the horrible consequences of distracted driving.

To learn more about the dangers of distracted driving and what you can do to prevent this deadly behavior, please visit distraction.gov

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ADHD and teenage drivers

4/3/2012

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A number of cognitive conditions can affect driving, but the largest group of challenged teenage drivers — and the mostly closely studied — appears to be those with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.  A 2007 study by Russell A. Barkley of the Medical University of South Carolina and Daniel J. Cox of the University of Virginia Health System, concluded that young drivers with A.D.H.D. are two to four times as likely as those without the condition to have an accident — meaning that they are at a higher risk of wrecking the car than an adult who is legally drunk. 

Researchers say that many teenagers with attention or other learning problems can become good drivers, but not easily or quickly, and that some will be better off not driving till they are older — or not at all.

The most obvious difficulty they face is inattention, the single leading cause of crashes among all drivers. “When a driver takes his eyes off the road for two seconds or more, he’s doubled the risk of a crash,” said Bruce Simons-Morton, senior investigator at the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development in Bethesda, Md.

Inexperienced drivers usually are distractible drivers. In a study on a closed course, teenagers proved much more adept than adults at using cellphones while driving, bujt missed more stop signs.

But A.D.H.D. involves more than distractibility. Its other major trait is impulsiveness, which is often linked to high levels of risk-taking.  Teenagers are more prone to crashes because of inattention, but “the reason their crashes are so much worse is because they are so often speeding,” said Dr. Barkley.  Many drivers with A.D.H.D. overestimate their skills behind the wheel.

Source:  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/27/health/add-and-adhd-challenge-those-seeking-drivers-license.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

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Backup cameras may be standard equipment

2/28/2012

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On average, two children die and about 50 are injured every week when someone accidentally backs over them in a vehicle, according to KidsAndCars.org, a nonprofit group that pushed the government to begin tracking such tragedies. And more than two-thirds of the time, a parent or other close relative is behind the wheel.

Now, auto safety regulators have decided to do something about it. Federal regulators plan to announce that automakers will be required to put rearview cameras in all passenger vehicles by 2014 to help drivers see what is behind them. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) proposed the mandate in late 2010 and will soon send a final version of the rule to Congress.

Cars are filled with safety features that have been mandated by government regulators over the years, including air bags and the third brake light, but the rearview camera requirement is one of the biggest steps taken to protect people outside of a vehicle.

"We haven't done anything else to protect pedestrians," said Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety in Washington. "This is one thing we can do and should do."

Regulators predicted that adding the cameras and viewing screens will cost the auto industry as much as $2.7 billion a year, or $160 to $200 a vehicle.  The cost will be passed on to consumers through higher prices, but regulators say that 95 to 112 deaths and as many as 8,374 injuries could be avoided each year by eliminating the wide blind spot behind a vehicle. Government statistics indicate that 228 people of all ages - 44 percent of whom are under age 5 - die every year in backover accidents involving passenger vehicles. About 17,000 people a year are injured in such accidents.

"In terms of absolute numbers of lives saved, it certainly isn't the highest," Mr. Ditlow said. "But in terms of emotional tragedy, backover deaths are some of the worst imaginable. When you have a parent that kills a child in an incident that's utterly avoidable, they don't ever forget it."

Although they account for a small fraction of the deaths that result from automobile crashes, backovers are the most common cause of off-road deaths involving children and vehicles.  As vehicles have become larger and designed to better protect occupants, drivers' ability to see any people or objects behind them has been reduced, said Dan Edmunds, director of vehicle testing at Edmunds.com.

"Over time, the beltlines have risen, and the glass has gotten a little smaller in the interest of safety," Mr. Edmunds said. "There's certainly been a lot of attention paid to safety, but visibility hasn't necessarily been lumped in the same way."

Edmunds now measures the size of the blind spot behind each new vehicle, based on how far back the driver can see a mannequin designed to resemble a small child. Although many backover incidents involve S.U.V.'s and trucks, Mr. Edmunds said some of the biggest blind spots are on passenger cars where the trunk has a high deck lid and the driver sits low to the ground.

For the Cadillac CTS-V coupe, Edmunds measured a blind spot 101 feet long, compared with about 40 feet for minivans from Toyota and Honda.

Automakers have generally supported the requirement, while some took issue with technical aspects of the backup camera proposal and the added cost. "We've had longstanding support for efforts to increase the field of view for these vehicles," said Wade Newton, of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers.

Regulators studied other ways of improving rear visibility, including the beeping radar-based sensors that many vehicles already offer. But they determined that the sensors often did not detect moving people, especially children. Drivers also responded better to the camera image than the audio alerts.

"Video camera-based systems are by far the most comprehensive and cost-effective currently available solution for reducing backover crashes, fatalities and injuries," according to NHTSA.

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Distractions cause crashes

12/20/2011

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Texting and talking on cell phones are distractions that cause collisions.  There were an estimated 3.092 deaths in crashes affected by distractions in 2010, according to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration.  Overall, 32,885 people died in traffic crashes in the United States in 2010.  The good news is that represents a 3 percent drop and the lowest number of fatalities since 1949.  Traffic deaths have been declining steadily for several years.  Why?  Better designed and equipped cars.  Bucking the trend, there were 4,502 motorcycle deaths in 2010, a 0.7 percent increase.
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    Author

    Scott Brazil is an attorney in Houston, Texas, who is board certified in Personal Injury and Civil Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization.

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