Keep Your Teen Driver Safe

With a new school year underway one of our main concerns as the Injury Prevention Team and as parents is keeping our teen drivers safe. First we must lead by example and enforce safety rules…so everyone comes home for the family supper. With the increase in traffic in our area, drivers who are unfamiliar with the area may be distracted looking for road signs or may be fatigued due to long hours of driving. A constant flow of semis, farm equipment and land owners are traveling on gravel roads that were not designed for the increased traffic. Narrow state & county highways seeing larger vehicles traveling regularly on them, all make for increased dangers for our inexperienced – distracted teen drivers.

Scary Teen Driver

Statistics

Motor vehicle crashes are the #1 killer of 16-20 year olds.

1 out of 5 licensed 16-year old drivers nationwide are involved in a vehicle crash.

Nearly as many 16 & 17 year old drivers are involved in a fatal crash between 3 and 5 pm, Monday – Friday as on Friday and Saturday nights between 9pm and 2am.

61% of teen age passenger deaths happened when another teen was driving.

Over 60% of American teens admit to risky driving, and nearly half of those that admit to risky driving also admit to text messaging behind the wheel.

3 out of 10 teens say that in the past six months their driving behavior put them at risk.

39% of Montana high school students reported never or rarely using a seat belt while driving.

57.3% reported never or rarely using a seat belt as a passenger.

More teens are texting so more teens are dying. According to NHTSA in June of 2011 more than 196 billion text messages were sent or received in the US, up nearly 50% from June of 2009. While a teen is texting they are spending about 10% of their time outside of their lane according to statistics. With the increase in traffic in our community, can anyone afford to spend any time outside of their lane? Answering a text takes away about 5 seconds of a driver’s attention, that’s enough time to travel the length of a football field.

Talk with your teen about safe driving habits. According to Teen Driving Source: “Researchers have long known that parenting style (your approach to raising your teen) can greatly influence whether your child avoids or takes part in risky behaviors. Now results from our National Young Driver Survey show that your parenting approach may even save your teen’s life by lowering crash risk. Teens who described their parents as authoritative (highly supportive and involved, set rules, and monitor) reported fewer risky driving behaviors and half the crash risk in the last year as teens who described their parents as less involved. The Teen Driving Source found teens with involved parents:

are twice as likely to wear seat belts

are 70 less likely to drink and drive

are half as likely to speed

are 30 percent less likely to use a cell phone while driving

ALWAYS-ALWAYS BUCKLE YOUR SAFETY BELT WHEN IN A VEHICLE! NEVER USE A CELL PHONE WHEN DRIVING IN A VEHICLE!

The Richland County Injury Prevention Team has several resources to help you and your teen become educated on safe driving habits. For more information or to become involved in the effort to keep our teens safe in our community contact Mary Friesz, Richland County Injury Prevention Specialist at the Richland County Health Department 433-2207.