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Essay on distracted driving
Essay on distracted driving
Essay on distracted driving
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Distracted Driving Kelsey Raffaele was driving home one day, when her car ran off the road and had hit a snow bank and spiraled into oncoming traffic. She then got T-boned by a SUV. She was rushed to the hospital where she died without even regaining consciousness. Police had recreated the scene with chalk and had thought to have been the causes from just a novice driver. Until they had found a cellphone in the back of the mangled car. Kelsey was actually on the phone while driving, and had crashed. The last words Kelsey got to say was “I’m Going to Crash” over the phone to a friend (Lowy). She is not the only one who uses cellular devices and drives, she was just one of the few who did and got in an accident. There is more than just texting, there’s GPS, radios, Mp3 players and another big one is other passengers. Distracted driving is getting easier for you to do and for more than one reason, there’s the new technology that keeps coming out keeping our eyes from the road, texting is probably the worst distraction and passengers really help lead to car accidents. In 2009 a federal data report had said that distracted drivers where the cause of 3,331 deaths and injuring an additional 387,000 (Fuller). “Car accidents are the No. 1 cause of death of teens” says Cricket Fuller, he also says that “a quarter of all teen-driving crashes are attributed to distract driving”. Even though the death rate of teen drivers is going down, an average of seven deaths a day still occur (Kowalski). Debacco-Ernie had said that “any time a teen driver is out on the road after 10 p.m., the probability of them being involved in a crash increases dramatically” (Carr). 4.6 seconds is the time to travel the length of a football field if you are go... ... middle of paper ... ... Teens Who Text and Drive Take Even More Risks." Gannett News Service: n.p. May 10 2013. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 7 Nov. 2013 . Kowalski, Megan, and Jayne O'Donnell. "Big Brother Watches Teen Drivers." USA TODAY. 18 Jul 2013: B.4. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 07 Nov 2013. Lowy, Joan. "Study: Distracted Driving Deaths Underreported." Gleaner. 08 May 2013: n.p. SIRS I Neyfakh, Leon. "Why We Can't Stop." Boston Globe. 06 Oct 2013: K.1. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 15 Dec 2013.ssues Researcher. Web. 07 Nov 2013. Solis, Steph. "California Court Bans use of Smart Phone Maps while Driving." Christian Science Monitor: n.p. Apr 08 2013. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 7 Nov. 2013 . Vlasic, Bill. "Designing Dashboards with Fewer Distractions." New York Times: B.1. Jul 06 2013. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 7 Nov. 2013
As Americans have seen an increase in the amount of texting and driving, there have been several of the 50 states that have put laws in place to help try and put a reduction on the amount of fatalities. The devastating part about this kind of distraction is that nearly every person that owns a cell phone has picked it up at some point while they are driving to make a phone call or send a quick text. They have seen the commercials and they know the hurt that it has caused many families losing someone they love, but we still do it anyways. It’s so easy to tell yourself “It’s just one quick text, I will be fine.” At some point we need to realize this is not ok.
article,” Distracted driving” by The Utah Department of public safety. Out of those 5,013 crashes
Piper, Andy. "Lawmakers Try to 'Cell' Phone Limits for Drivers." Telegraph – Herald. Feb 01 2010. ProQuest. Web. 11 Apr. 2014.
One day Chandler Gerber 23, of Bluffton collided with an Amish buggy back in April of 2012. A three year old boy and a five year old girl were killed. A 17 year old boy who was in critical condition died several days later. Chandler was sending a text that said “ I love you” to his wife when he caused the accident. Drivers who were texting were 23.2 times more likely to crash to those who weren’t texting (Cell Phones and Texting). The increasing amount of crashes caused from texting and driving and growing and becoming more of a problem. Distracted driving is an increasing problem in the United States resulting in many accidents, but a solution to the problem would be banning cellphones while driving.
According to Stephanie Hanes in the essay “Texting While Driving Is as Dangerous as Drunk Driving,” a driver on a phone and those talking on a phone are four times likely to crash. This statistic shows how dangerous using the phone or even texting is while driving. As technology has increased, so has the use of cellphone. Distracted driving has caused an increase in car fatalities and disasters. However, distracted driving can be prevented if drivers take precautions, but no matter what we do, trouble will always be spelling on the road.
Most people think of someone using their cell phone while driving when they hear distracted driving, but it it much more than that. Distracted driving is when someone who is behind the wheel get distracted by either taking their hands off the wheel or take their mind of driving, which can cause them to get into an accident (paragraph 2). Distracted driving is broken down into three main parts, manual distractions which is taking your hands off the steering wheel, visual distractions which is taking your center of attention off the road and cognitive distraction which is when your mind is not focused on driving and just starts drifting away (paragraph 3). Cell phone use is easily the biggest cause of distracted driving compared to eating, talking, and others because using your cell phone requires visual, manual and cognitive attention from the person behind the wheel and in a study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Association, the amount of people who break the law and use a handheld device behind the wheel increases every single year. An estimated amount of more than, six hundred thousand people use their phone while driving. Distracted driving has quickly risen and developed in the past few years and is becoming an enormous problem. In a recent study, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), showed statistics of approximately three thousand, one hundred fifty
Texting and driving are not alone done by teens but as well as adults. A survey by AT&T provided by USA TODAY has showed that almost half of all adults admit to texting while driving in comparison to the 43% of teenagers who text and drive. "Texting while driving is not just a teen problem," says John Ulczycki of the National Safety Council. This quote shows that not alone are teens committing this act but also teens. Showing that it should not be banned only for teens but also adults since this “epidemic” has no age.
Nearly twenty-five percent of all accidents are caused by texting and driving. Everyday the number of cellphone users rises, and with that comes an increasing amount of accidents caused by texting and driving. It causes almost eleven teen deaths every day. Writing about her son, John Breen, a mother says, “He was willing to sacrifice his life for our country. It wasn’t war that took JB from us. It wasn’t a bullet or a bomb. It was a text message sent on a little 2” x 4” box that ended his life on a beautiful Sunday afternoon”(DWI:Driving While Intexticated). JB’s mom goes on to discuss the fact JB thought he was invincible and did not listen to his father, only hours before the accident, when he told him to put the phone down because it was
The cdc.gov says, "Everyday more that 9 people are killed in the united states and more than 1,153 people are injured in car crashes that are reported involving a distracted driver."Distracted driving is driving while doing another activity that takes drivers ' attention away from driving. An everyday activity that is dangerous is being distracted while driving. Three situations that can cause driving to be dangerous are texting while driving, being under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs while operating a vehicle,being distracted by passengers inside the car.
Teens should be the last group of people to break this law. “Texting while driving makes crashes 23 times more likely”. As drivers become more experienced and older texting while driving increases. For example, “24 percent of 16 year olds said they text and drive, as opposed to the 58 percent of 18 year olds that don’t”. In general teens text much more than adults while driving. As a matter of fact, “82 percent of drivers between the ages of 16 to 24 have admitted to reading a text message while driving”. Not only are teens unexperienced but are trying to pull off the nearly impossible task while driving. Texting while driving is leading cause of death among teenagers passing the death rate of drinking and driving. Studies show that if this trend continues, more than 3,000 teenagers will die next year. For example if a driver sends a 5 second text message while moving 55 mph it is equal to driving a whole football field lengt...
Each day in the United States, over 8 people are killed and 1,161 injured in crashes that are reported to involve a distracted driver (Distracted Driving). There are a few different
Teenagers don’t want to be inconvenient with having to wait to respond to their friends about the latest party or school event that’s coming up. Driving is just as good of time as any to text their best friends about the upcoming weekend or update their Facebook status in the mind of a young adult. Even though most teens know they shouldn’t text and drive many are guilty of doing it several times a day. An overwhelming 75% of teens even admit to text messaging while driving (“Distracted Driving,” 2016). Young drivers are more likely to get into an accident due to lack of experience than that of any other driver on the road. Add in texting to the mix it is a recipe for disaster. About 54% of teenage motor vehicle crash deaths occur on Friday, Saturday or Sunday – with Saturday being the deadliest day of the week for teens (Hosansky, 2012). Teenage motor vehicle fatalities are at the highest in the summer months.
One of the major cell phone companies AT&T, has had enormous success in launching its “It Can Wait” campaign.AT&T is using its campaign to show ttenagers the damaging effects of texting and driving and what it can do to everyone around. Texting and driving should be tied into the school systems learning guidelines as most teenagers think that texting and driving is not as big of a deal as it seems to be. In a study done by() results showed that thirteen percent of drivers age eighteen to twenty involved in car accidents admitted to being on their phones at the time of the crash. And seventy seven percent of teenagers say they are somewhat confident in that they can text and drive safely. This should be a a major eye opener to all members of society. The new generation has very little real world experience in how texting and driving can really affect them and their
Texting while driving is a widespread epidemic in the United States that has unfavorable effects on our society.“Driving while texting is the standard wording used for traffic violations” (Bernstein). It causes many people to be distracted which can lead to accidents. “Eighty-nine percent of people own a cell phone” (Gardner). That is a plethora of people that are at risk of texting while driving. Also, texting has increased by ten times in three years(Bernstein). “The risk of a crash for those who are texting is twenty-three point two times greater than those who are not” (Gardner).Driving drunk only makes a person seven times more likely to be in a crash (Bernstein). This means texting while driving is three times more dangerous than driving intoxicated. One in five drivers admits to texting while driving(Gardner). This shows that that texting while driving is a widespread epidemic. When a survey asked teenagers whether they text and drive,“seventy five percent of teens admitted to texting while driving” (7).Distracted driving causes seventy-eight percent of car crashes(Bernstein). “No distraction causes as high of a risk of an accident as texting while driving” (Gardner). Also with these statistics, it is not hard to understand why accidents in teenagers that are driving have risen. The Bluetooth capability in cars gives a driver a hands-free way to talk on the phone, but is still not completely safe (8). Also, only 1 out of 3 US cars sold in 2009 had this feature. New systems are being developed that will use Bluetooth as well a global positioning technology to allow parents to monitor cell phone use and texting while driving (10).
Fifty percent of teen drivers have admitted to frequently using their phones while driving; twenty percent of people have said they browse the web while driving, causing eighteen percent of these accidents to result in fatal injuries. In 2013 alone 424,000 people were injured in a driving accident where the driver was texting and not paying attention to their surroundings. People are constantly on their phones, never being able to put them away which leads them to text and drive, therefore making the roads unsafe and putting everybody else on the road safety in jeopardy.