Please Get Off The Damn Cellphone While Driving

Did you know this causes 28% of all traffic crashes?

It's seriously time to put that phone down.

These tragic accidents happen when people talk on cell phones, or send text messages while driving. Why now? The holidays mean there's lots more drivers on the road - and this means more accidents.

Even though we're more busier, we can easily avoid these headaches. The answer: just wait a few minutes, either by pulling over 'safely', or waiting to reach your destination. It's the smartest choice!

Please find 2 reports below:

Video:

OMG: New video warns of distracted driving dangers

In an effort to get the message out about the dangers of distracted driving, the Department of Transportation has released a new public service announcement (PSA) titled “OMG” that will be shown next month at movie theaters and gas stations nationwide.

Throughout the month of December, the PSA will appear on Regal Cinema movie screens and via PumpTop TV in an effort to reach teens directly—at the theater or when filling up their car. And now that the holiday driving season is upon us, it’s very important to reach teen drivers as parties, vacation days, and new high-tech gifts will introduce new temptations and risks.

The hard-hitting PSA uses popular texting phrases like LOL and L8R to get the message across to this younger audience, as well as some creative Hollywood effects.

Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death for teenagers, and teens have a higher likelihood that they will text and drive. Sixteen percent of all distracted driving crashes involve drivers under 20.

For more on distracted driving, see distraction.gov and also our special section Distracted driving and teen safety.
 

Report by the National Safety Council

The vast majority of those crashes - 1.4 million of them - are caused by cell phone conversations, while an additional 200,000 are blamed on text messaging, the council report said.
 
Because of the extent of the problem, federal transportation officials unveiled a new organization Tuesday, patterned after Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), that will combat driver cell phone use. (the group, FocusDriven, grew out of a meeting on distracted driving sponsored by the U.S. Department of Transportation in Washington last year).

Virtually everyone owns a cell phone, and it's evident to anyone who drives regularly that huge numbers of people - including some who support a ban - use them while driving. Persuading people to break that habit will be a tall order for FocusDriven.

Enforcement of a texting ban requires officers to observe an act that usually is conducted in a driver's lap, and hands-free devices make it possible to talk on cell phones without being observed. More than 120 studies of cell phone use suggest that requiring hands-free devices doesn't eliminate the distraction caused by a phone conversation.

"It's not easy to enforce (a ban), but it's not impossible," said Chuck Hurley, executive director of MADD, who attended Tuesday's announcement of the new group's formation. "The main reason people talk on their cell phones is because they can. Eventually, (signal blocking) technology will address that."

Whether there is the political will to enforce bans on cell phone use is another matter.

Bans on text messaging illustrate the challenge. Nineteen states, including California, and the District of Columbia have banned it, but in four of those states - Virginia, New York, Washington and Louisiana - the laws require that an officer have some other primary reason for stopping a vehicle.

Hurley, who spent 21 years with the National Safety Council before joining MADD, has been involved with virtually all of the major traffic safety campaigns for more than three decades.

His experience suggests that new laws and educational campaigns don't provide sufficient incentive for most drivers to change their habits.

"A lot of goodwill is created and people die just the same," he said. "Education alone is a proven failure. Education and enforcement are a success."