Texting and Driving

On Thursday, The Boston Globe reported that a Massachusetts judge sentenced a teenage driver to jail for causing a fatal crash.  The teen’s vehicle crossed the center line and hit another vehicle head-on.  One of the two occupants of the other vehicle was seriously injured. The second occupant of the other vehicle suffered massive injuries and died 18 days later after removal of life support.  The injuries and loss of life are tragic, more so because the teenage driver was texting while driving.

I googled “texting and driving” and the statistics are sobering. According to the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, a driver is 23 times more likely to be involved in a car accident while texting and driving.  Texting and driving results in a 400 % increase in time spent with their focus away from the road. Texting while driving is roughly six times more likely to result in an accident than drunk driving.  Was it an accident or was it negligence?  Could this accident have been avoided if the teenager wasn’t texting? 

National Highway Transportation Safety Administration research indicates that nearly 6,000 people died and more than 500,000 were injured in crashes due to distracted drivers in 2008.  The same research shows 21% of fatal car crashes involving teenagers were the result of cell phone usage.

The teenager in Massachusetts, 17 years old at the time to of the accident and 18 at the time of sentencing, will spend a year in jail followed by a year of community service.  His license was suspended for 15 years. He’ll have to live with the knowledge that his negligence caused a death. Can you imagine defining your future on a single act?

Governments can pass laws to ban texting and driving.  The media can quote statistics ad nauseum in an attempt to convince people that texting and driving is a fatal mix. But ultimately, we must make the choice not to text and drive.  If you haven’t already watched the video “The Last Text” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DebhWD6ljZs&feature=player_embedded , it is well worth your time.  And your kids’ time.

Before you think about sending or checking that text message, remember the words from a Massachusetts State Police statement, “…the victim’s family will always have an empty seat at their table, a hole in their lives, and only memories of the person they loved. That’s what distracted driving does.”