If you doubt how dangerous texting and driving is Mr. Harrison could come to your home and give you a firsthand demonstration.  Imagine if someone had been sitting in that building in Harrison’s path.  Imagine it was a mother and two children.  Imagine it was you and your children or grandchildren.  Mr. Harrison’s thoughtless actions could have resulted in the wrongful death of fellow Hoosier.  It could have resulted in serious personal injury such as  spinal cord injury, brain injury, broken bones, paralysis.  It could have wiped out a family or taken the bread winner from their family.  No good comes from texting and driving.  It is a selfish and thoughtless act.  It demonstrates a complete lack of concern for the welfare of our fellow Hoosiers.  Mr. Harrison, you were lucky. Take this opportunity to make a difference.  Never text and drive again.  Do what you can to get this message out.

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 A collision in Noblesville, over the holiday weekend, is more evidence of the dangers associated with distracting a driver. Nicholas Killinger was northbound on Ind. 37, just south of 206^th street, when he was distracted by a passenger.  Killinger’s pickup truck crossed the center line on collided head-on with a Kia Spectra driven by Daniel Stone.  Daniel Stone, and his passenger, Lisa Stone both suffered wrongful death as a result of Mr. Killinger being distracted. Mr. Killinger’s passengers were seriously injured in the accident. 

Anything that distracts a driver away from their duty of operating a car safely must be avoided. Other examples of common distractions include texting while driving, driving while talking on the cell phone, reading anything such as a map or a paper, the list goes on and on.  If you must do anything that will take your attention away from the road, please pull of the road to a safe location and take care of your business.  After you have safely concluded your work, drive again.  Parents, please have this discussion with your children.  Children, please have this conversation with your parents and your friends. We all want to get where we are going safely.  Avoiding distracted driving will help us all.

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Newer cars and phones have blue tooth accessibility.  If the car does not have Bluetooth, an ear piece can be used.  Is this use of a cell phone safer while driving? A University of Utah study demonstrated that “[b]oth handheld and hands-free cell phones impaired driving, with no significant difference in the degree of impairment.” Reference the University of Utah News Center, “Drivers On Cell Phones Are As Bad As Drunks”, (2006), www.unews.utah.edu/p/?r=062206-1.    The study found that drivers on cell phones are slower to engage the brakes, were less inclined to maintain proper following distances, and were more likely to crash.   The National Safety Council issued a white paper in 2010 indicates that talking on a cell phone, whether handheld or hands-free, increased the risk of accident four fold.

As Indianapolis Accident and Injury Attorneys working all over the State of Indiana for Hoosiers seriously injured by negligent drivers, we are very concerned about the dangers that cell phone use while driving creates.  We have seen, firsthand, Hoosiers dealing with spinal cord injury, paralysis, broken bones, brain injury, amputations, all because the driver was distracted by cell phone use.  The Utah study likened the distractions caused by cell phone use to a drunk driver causing a drunk driving accident with a blood alcohol level of .08, the legal limit from driving while intoxicated.

Be careful out there.  Get off that cell phone while driving.  Your child wants you home safe, and all the others human beings on the road want to get home safe to their families.

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Although distracted drivers come from all age groups, Zoeller noted that “Young drivers may already have a false sense of invulnerability. Couple that with the fact that today’s young drivers are from a generation that has possessed cell phones longer than they have had driver’s licenses, and you have a recipe for a multi-tasking disaster."

The AG also warned drivers of the potential legal liability for a distracted driving road accident: “Texting while driving will put you immediately at fault, and so you should consider whether your auto insurance company will cover your own negligence."

Under an Indiana law enacted in 2009, it is illegal for any motorist age 18 and younger to text or use any wireless devices while driving. Legislation is pending that would ban texting for all drivers regardless of age.  Although enforcement of these kinds of well-intentioned laws may help to improve highway safety and avoid car wrecks to some degree, the best way to avoid a distracted driving highway accident is to never be texting yourself and to keep an eye out for other motorists paying insufficient attention to the road.

For more information on the AT&T roadway safety initiative, visit the company’s online resource center.

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In a new study, a traffic safety research organization claims that the steady increase in nighttime highway accident fatalities among teen drivers nationally over the past ten years comes more from distracted drivers rather than drunk drivers. All this is happening while overall highway fatal accidents are on the decline, although drunk driving fatalities are apparently increasing for the 20-and-0ver cohort.

A senior research engineer for the Texas Transportation Institute, the study’s author, explained  that nighttime driving is the most common, documented factor associated with crashes involving young drivers. Other factors include darkness, slow response time because of fatigue, and–as we noted above–lack of experience driving under adverse conditions. Additional variables include other minors in the car, speeding, not buckling up, and of course, alcohol. But cell phone use appears to be the major risk factor.

“Being on a cell phone behind the wheel impairs our driving ability,” the engineer said. “When you add the nighttime danger, you create the perfect storm, and that storm is much more severe for young drivers, largely because of their lack of driving experience.”

The report concludes as follows:

The findings of this analysis suggest that alcohol is contributing to an increase in nighttime fatal crashes involving drivers age 20 and older. However, the same is not true for teenage drivers, suggesting that factors other than alcohol are responsible for the trend of increased nighttime crashes for teens…However, it is cell phone use – propelled by rapid technological advancement and increased affordability – that is likely the most notable new driving risk factor for contemporary teens.

To read the entire report, including statistics for Indiana, visit the Texas Transportation Institute’s website.

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On his blog, Secretary LaHood explains that Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration research indicates that texting motorists take their eyes off the road for an average of 4.6 seconds out of every 6 seconds , and that at 55 miles per hour, that 4.6 seconds is enough time to cover the length of an entire football field including both end zones. "Now, imagine a truck or bus hurtling that distance at that speed with a driver whose attention is not on the road ahead. I think you can see that there would be consequences," the secretary added.

The proposed rules for the commercial texting ban were published in the April 1 edition of the Federal Register as required by federal government procedures. The deadline for public input is May 3. To learn more about the specifics of the proposal and even to file formal comments, go to Regulation Room.

If you have been injured by a texting truck or bus driver, or even by someone texting behind the wheel in a passenger car, please call Young and Young in Indianapolis for a free consultation.  We have 55 years of experience to help you and your family obtain full compensation for  injuries caused by distracted drivers, regardless of the cause of the distraction, on Indiana roads.

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CBSNews.com explains the methodology:

In this latest study, the University of Utah psychologists analyzed the responses of 200 participants, who were first tested in a driving simulator, and then again driving while also engaged in a hands-free cell phone conversation involving word memorization and math problem-solving.

The researchers measured reactions in braking, the drivers’ following distance on the "freeway," memory, and math computation.

Results showed that for 97.5 percent of the subjects, performance suffered across the board when both driving and talking on a hands-free cell phone.

One of the study’s co-authors commented that "Given the number of individuals who routinely talk on the phone while driving, one would have hoped that there would be a greater percentage of supertaskers."

The full study will appear in an upcoming issue of the Psychonomic Bulletin and Review.

The issue of technologically distracted drivers is not going away anytime soon. Undoubtedly more research data will be coming, along with additional legal restrictions on mobile communications technology. In the meantime, if you or a loved one have been injured on Indiana roads by a distracted driver, regardless of the cause of the distraction, contact the personal injury lawyers at Young and Young in Indianapolis. Rest assured that our firm, which has been operating under the Young and Young name for more than 55 years, has the knowledge to fully and aggressively represent Hoosiers and their families who have been hurt or killed in a traffic crash on Indiana roads.

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An AAA Hoosier Motor Club official claims that DWT (driving while texting) is more dangerous than driving while intoxicated. “Recent studies show that text messaging decreases a person’s reaction time by 35 percent and their steering control by 91 percent,” the official said. The Indiana law, if enacted, would make texting a Class C infraction punishable by a fine of up to $500. The federal government wants to ban texting in all 50 states. This would require an act of Congress to implement, however.  In an initial step, the U.S. Department of Transportation recently banned bus and truck drivers from texting while operating a commercial vehicle.

As we mentioned in a previous post, although enforcement of these kinds of  well-intentioned laws and regulations may help to improve highway safety to some degree, the best way to avoid a road accident or a highway accident is to not be texting yourself and to keep an eye out for other motorists paying insufficient attention to the road.

If you have been injured by a texting truck or bus driver, or even a person texting in a passenger car, please call Young and Young in Indianapolis for a free consultation.  We have 55 years of experience to help you and your family obtain full compensation for your injuries caused by distracted drivers on Indiana roads.

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Semi tractor Trailers are huge powerful engines driving our economy.  We depend on them for the abundance that is the American way of life.  Other trucks join in making us the envy of the world. However, because of their size, when they collide with a passenger car in a highway accident, the results can be horrific.  Wrongful death is common.  Brain injuries and spinal cord injuries happen frequently, injuries resulting in paralysis, including quadriplegia and paraplegia, change people’s lives. Burns and back injuries are also common.

A recent trend is helping to raise accident rates across the country – texting and driving.  You see it all the time, a car swerving, and you wonder what’s going on until you pull up to see if you can help and there is a person with one hand on the wheel and a phone in the other with the driver looking up and down constantly, paying almost no attention to the road.  I see this on the highways.  Talk about a recipe for a disastrous highway accident.  In fact statistics show that texting while driving has a similar impact on the drivers ability to control their car as a drinking and driving. Here is a startling fact issued by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, drivers who send and receive text messages take their eyes off the road for an average of 4.6 seconds out of every 6 seconds while texting. At 55 miles per hour, this means that the driver is traveling the length of a football field, including the end zones, without looking at the road.

To deal with this problem there has been a movement in both state and federal legislation to prohibit texting and driving. The United States Department of Transportation passed regulations last week designed to prohibit bus drivers and truck drivers from sending text messages while operating a commercial vehicle.  These rules apply to trucks and buses on the highway, with a weight of more than 10,000 pounds. The penalty for violating these rules is a fine up to $2,750.00.

Smart accident attorneys and injury attorneys know that there is likely no way for the government to enforce these rules and regulations.  Although I hope these rules and regulations help, I still think the best way to avoid a road accident or a highway accident, is to not be texting yourself.   This allows you to keep your eyes on the road, and to look out for other drivers who are not paying attention to the road.  Please, parents have this discussion with your children – tell them not to text and drive.  Tell them to keep an eye out for others not paying attention to the road.

If you want to learn more about highway safety, contact young and Young.  If you have been injured by a texting truck or bus driver, or even a person texting in a passenger car, please call Young and Young for a free consultation.  We will meet in our office or in your home or hospital room.  We have 55 years of experience to help you and your family.

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