April is Distracted Driving Awareness Month

The four types of distractions are Visual – looking at something other than the road. Auditory – hearing something not related to driving. Manual – manipulating something other than the steering wheel. And Cognitive – thinking about something other than driving.

FIVE FACTS YOU SHOULD KNOW BEFORE TEXTING AND DRIVING

• You’re at a huge risk
  Text messaging increases the risk of crash or near-crash by 23 times.

• Teens are at a huge risk
  The fatal crash rate for teens is 3 times greater than for drivers age 20 and over

• Teens are not better at texting
  Driver distraction is responsible for more than 58% of teen crashes.

• Most people are hazards
  Over 80% of drivers admit to blatantly hazardous behavior while driving, such as changing clothes, steering with a foot, painting nails, or even shaving.

• 5 seconds is a long time
  Sending or reading a text message takes your eyes off the road for about 5 seconds, long enough to cover a football field while driving at 55 mph.

Each day in the United States, approximately nine people are killed and more than 1,000 injured in crashes that are reported to involve a distracted driver.

WHY DISTRACTED DRIVER AWARENESS MONTH IS IMPORTANT

1. TEXTING AND SWERVING- People who text and drive, statistically spend 10% of their time on the road, outside their lane. Yikes! 
2. IT’S ILLEGAL- 43 of America’s 50 states have laws prohibiting texting and driving. South Dakota, New Mexico, Mississippi, Texas, Oklahoma, and Missouri have laws regulating it. Arizona just extended their reckless driving laws to cover texting.                          
3. TEXTING IS WORSE THAN DRUNK DRIVING- Texters are six times more likely to wreck their car than drivers over the legal drinking limit. How horrifying is that? Answer: Very.

Drive responsively and wait to make that phone call or text until after you have finished driving. You could unintentionally kill someone else or even yourself!