Drunk trucking: Protected?

[5-90]

what about all of the other things that we're putting in cars now a days?

navigation systems? DVD Players? Hell, even the radio causes distracted driving.

Map reading is becoming a lost art. I don't even own a GPS at the moment, and if I get one it will only have LAT/LONG/ALT displays (and maybe ground-track speed.) I don't need any more than that - after all, I'm perfectly capable of reading maps (and I even learned to draw a few styles of map in school. Put me down as an "amateur cartographer of intermediate skill.")

DVD player? Dumb idea.

Radio? If you can't find the controls without lookiing, work on it. I can hit any control I need to in my wife's car or my truck, without looking, and without hesitation. It took some practise, but it's a very useful little skill and should be cultivated.

I got hit 3 weeks ago by a girl that had dropped her phone on the floor. It was so important that she have it back that instant that she reached for the floorboard while driving and rearended me sitting at a stoplight. I was on the phone with ForeWheeler at the time. That very easily could have been anything she dropped and was reaching for.

True - it could have been anything. But there are different psychological factors at work with a cellphone than with anything else, in most case (people have attached a greatly - and falsely - inflated sense of importance to the damned things. Doesn't matter what I'm doing - if I suddenly need both hands to react to a situation, whatever I'm holding - drink, sammich, whatever - is going right out the window.) (Oh - you sure you want to admit that you were on the 'phone yourself at the time?)

DVD player? If it's in the driver's FOV and he's making use of it, the idea of giving him a series of Jap slaps with a halfshaft removed from the front end of his own vehicle has merit.

She didn't have the common sense to just wait until she was stopped at a light or in a parking lot before taking her eyes off the road to retrieve it.

Driver training has seemed to have removed the idea that "You are in control of two tons of metal - act accordingly" and fails to drive home the idea that you are responsible for your vehicle, for things that fall off of it, for things you run into with it, and for the people in it. I also understand they don't show those old driver training classics that some of you may remember: "Blood on the Highway" and "Red Asphalt." I guess people were getting grossed out by those movies - Good! Kinda drives home the idea...

What about Police officers? At any given moment their job requires them to be on any number of devices.
Cell phone
Radio
in car computer
camera system
lights and sirens

The incidence of "distracted driving" with LEOs tends to be lower, because the training standards are generally somewhat higher. However, I've also seen LEOs lapsing in their attention while they're driving - some people can't handle stimulation in that degree, and there are infrequent times where training just doesn't "take." Light & siren controls can be found by touch just like radio controls, window wiper controls, speed control system controls, .... There's a very good reason that these controls tend to be standardised...

Stupid people cause accidents, not technology.

True - but technology does not help stupid people. And, as long as we keep allowing people who are obviously not qualified to be in control of motor vehicles, it's going to require controls on technology. If we were to reinstitute proper standards in training & certification, we'd end up with safer roadways (partly because we'd have people better able to actually drive, and partly because we'd have reduced traffic on the roadways in the first place. Let 'em take the damned bus, and expand the systems. We'd also come out ahead in roadway maintenance as well, since the necessary costs would drop quickly.)

But, people have misconstrued the operation of a motor vehicle to be a "right" vice "privilege," and not many people fail the driving exam - unless they should somehow do so rather egregiously. While we do have a right to freely move about the country, there's no guarantee of just how we should be permitted to do so - theoretically, you're perfectly free to walk from New York City to Los Angeles. However, there's nothing that says you must be allowed to drive that trip - and you can always take an aeroplane, a bus, a train, thumb your way across the country, walk on your hands, or whatever. There is no right to drive, there's just a right to move.

Sadly, the state doesn't do so much to pull the licenses of people who should have them no longer - or should never have had them in the first place. This damages national productivity (injuries resulting from roads incidents,) presents a drain on the economy (not as bad as you'd think, but a lot of money still gets tied up in roadway maintenance,) traffic tends to inhibit the flow of logistics, and that's just what I can think of in five seconds. I could analyse the problem rather further, if necessary - I'm sure there are a lot of other factors that are affected by the prevalence of incompetence on public roadways.

 

[lucky9]

All I can say is that if they're going to put a Check Point down the road from the local Bar, then they also ought to put one down the road from the Doctor's office and the Pharmacies. If we could get those little old ladies with pink, yellow, blue, or green hair off of the road it will make the roads safer. Half of them are stoned on Flexeril, Ativan, or Xanax. Or some strong pain meds.

 

[5-90]

All I can say is that if they're going to put a Check Point down the road from the local Bar, then they also ought to put one down the road from the Doctor's office and the Pharmacies. If we could get those little old ladies with pink, yellow, blue, or green hair off of the road it will make the roads safer. Half of them are stoned on Flexeril, Ativan, or Xanax. Or some strong pain meds.

Flexeril is a muscle relaxant - it won't make you loopy (much,) but it will kill off your reaction times.

Adavan/lorazepam? I wouldn't want anyone driving around hipheading on that stuff - amnesiac, sedative, hypnotic - it's one of the stronger varieties of benzodiazepine, as I recall.

Xanax? Another benzodiazepine, I wouldn't want anyone driving around on the stuff.

Pain meds? Individual variation applies. However, I try to not take any Norco (hydrocodone/APAP 10/325mg) when I'm driving, even though it doesn't have any psychoactive effects on me (and doesn't slow down my reaction times that anyone can tell - but at about 130kg body mass 10mg of hydrocodone isn't much, it merely "detaches" the pain. I can still feel it.

But, most of these L.O.L.'s you're referring to have a body mass half of mine - or less! - and they're going to be hit a good deal harder by this stuff than I am.

And yes, if we're going to clamp down on DUI, that should be under the influence of pretty much any depressant, sedative, hypnotic, or whatever else, since it's just as dangerous as being drunk. Or worse.

Prescription or no.

Most of these oldsters are more stoned than I've probably ever been - I've seen them milling about smartly on foot, and they're farther gone than I've ever been on morphine and/or fentanyl! Yeah, I've become quite the connoisseur of painkillers over the years - too many times being a trauma case...)

I know the "too old to drive" bar moves around a lot, but it gets pulled down pretty far once benzodiazepines become involved - and the benzo family is pretty widely prescribed amongst the aged.

Taking someone with dimmed awareness and blunted reactions and making that worse through chemistry is right on the verge of creating a public hazzard, I think. When someone is put on anything in the benzodiazepine family (or something with similar effects - sedative, hypnotic, depressant, skeletal muscle relaxant, ...) serious thought should be given to clipping their wings for the public good.

Again, the ability to drive has become misconstrued as a "right" - and that's leading to an awful lot of the problems we're seeing on the roadways these days...

 

[5-90]

DELETED BY OP

 

[5-90]

DELETED BY OP

 

[87manche]

(Oh - you sure you want to admit that you were on the 'phone yourself at the time?)

yes, because I was at a full stop at a stoplight.

get over yourself. Responsible use of in car technology does not cause accidents. Not any more than mommy reaching to the back seat to feed/give a toy back to the screaming infant.

Should we now ban infants from cars because they cause distracted driving because parents are too lazy to stop the car and pull over to address their child?

What about CB radios? We've had those for decades, how is that any different than talking on a phone? Truckers have managed that for years. Have you ever talked on a CB whilst driving?

Stupid people cause accidents. Take away one thing and they'll just find another thing to distract themselves. Some people need no distraction, they're just crappy drivers, we call them Asians.



















(to the Asian community, it's just a joke, on the internet, have a laugh.)

 

[No4x4Yet]

Stupid people cause accidents. Take away one thing and they'll just find another thing to distract themselves.

+1

 

[5-90]

yes, because I was at a full stop at a stoplight.

I just wanted to make sure - like me, you're railing about people DWY - but you yourself were in a running vehicle with the 'phone to your ear (or on hands-free, you didn't say) at the time. It seemed an odd point....

get over yourself. Responsible use of in car technology does not cause accidents. Not any more than mommy reaching to the back seat to feed/give a toy back to the screaming infant.

I'm over me - no need to worry about that. However, "responsible use," as I'm sure you're aware, isn't very common. Throw in all of the "creature features" being put into vehicles these days (BMW's iDrive, "entertainment systems," navigation systems, and suchlike,) and most people out there "driving" (I use the term euphemistically) are little more than accidents looking for somewhere to happen. Part of the problem is basic driver training & certification these days - it's too farcical to even be bad comedy. My wife taught one of our boys, I taught the other. Dave made it through easily, because she taught to the test. I taught Chris to drive effectively, and he had the same problem I had - he spotted the errors in the test and therefore failed it (if they'd had the test in French, it would have been easier and he'd have passed, I'm sure. I took it in Arabic one year and Greek in another, and both were easier than the English version...)

Should we now ban infants from cars because they cause distracted driving because parents are too lazy to stop the car and pull over to address their child?

Tempting - when was the last time you'd driven with an infant in the vehicle? If you have, you know how distracting they can get - sometimes it's best to pull over and handle things, rather than divide attention and effort.

What about CB radios? We've had those for decades, how is that any different than talking on a phone? Truckers have managed that for years. Have you ever talked on a CB whilst driving?

Yes, and on vehicle-to-vehicle radios as well. I've known many people who have said that, for some odd reason, talking on a radio is less distracting than talking on the 'phone - and I think so as well. Pity there haven't been any studies on it...

Stupid people cause accidents. Take away one thing and they'll just find another thing to distract themselves. Some people need no distraction, they're just crappy drivers, we call them Asians.

(to the Asian community, it's just a joke, on the internet, have a laugh.)

Very true. But, as long as we're going to continue to allow the stupid and the incompetent on the roadways, everyone's going to end up suffering for it. The trainers are incompetent, the certifiers are incompetent, and the tests are badly written - this sounds like a recipe for failure to me (primarily because it means that more people get licenses who should not.)

(Asian drivers? One of the best drivers I'd known was a Japanese woman who grew up in Hawai'i. Depends on where they're from, I think. Vietnamese are probably the worst of the lot - but I've been through a good chunk of Southeast Asia, and we've still got worse drivers here in CA.)

Q: What's the last thing an Asian driver sees as he pulls off the freeway?






























































































A: (Raise middle finger high through open window.)

(As with 87manche, I'm kidding! It's called a "joke." I'm not politically correct, I don't intend to be, and I don't pretend to be. Thick skin makes it easier to go through life, y'know...)

 

[lucky9]

Responsible use of in car technology does not cause accidents. Not any more than mommy reaching to the back seat to feed/give a toy back to the screaming infant.

The studies are quite certain. There is no safe way to use a phone in a car if you are driving. Period.

That said, I suppose there are 1 in 1000?, 1 in 10,000?, that might be able to do so. I don't believe that is anywhere near enough.

As for the baby in the back seat argument.....PLEASE! Every other driver does not have a baby in the back seat screaming. A totally meaningless argument.

 

[DrMoab]

The studies are bunk and use junk science to validate their claims.

 

[5-90]

The studies are bunk and use junk science to validate their claims.

Explain, please.

While I tend to take studies with a grain of salt (I prefer to go with my own observations in general,) I'd like to hear your reasoning behind this.

After all, "even a stopped clock is right once a day" (I use 24-hour movements.)

 

[lucky9]

The studies are bunk and use junk science to validate their claims.

Bu**s&it

 

[DrMoab]

Its pretty simple....

When they do studies like these they tell you, "while you are on your phone you are XX times more likely to be in a crash than if you were not on your phone" or "you are XX times more likely to die in a crash while you are texting" or "texting while driving is just as dangerous as drinking" but its all a play on words. The simple truth is that unless you are a complete idiot (yes, I know there are plenty of these out there) that you are not going to be staring at your phone for the whole drive. It's in little fractions of time where as doing something like drinking and driving you are in that state of danger from the time you turn the key until you climb back out of the car again.

If I am driving down the road and someone calls me, the amount of time that I take my eyes off the road can be counted in seconds. Yes...while those seconds are ticking away I may be distracted but the nanny groups try to pass this off as statistically just as dangerous as drinking and it just isn't the same.

You may hate the fact that people are on their phones, you may hate phones but your hatred of them doesn't make them any more dangerous than anything else we have been doing in cars since we started driving them. A mom yelling at her kids, putting on makeup, doing her hair or a guy eating a burger, changing a radio station or looking at the hot blond next to him causes exactly the same distractions and we have had them forever. If phones were really that much more dangerous the statistics would show that the death rate on the highways would be hundreds of times higher than they were in the 70s and actually the opposite is true. Every year fewer and fewer deaths in autos happen yet the use of cell phones goes up by a huge order of magnitude. I heard the other day that Google is activating over 400,000 Android handsets A DAY!!! yet we don't have that order of magnitude higher auto accidents do we?

 

[iwannadie]

I had some idiot talking on their phone tonight in the middle of a rain storm(desert rain causes horrible road conditions). We are making a simple 90* left turn at a light, they managed to end up sideways blocking two lanes in front of me. They didn't think to drop the phone to maintain control the car however....

 

[tbburg]

Well, you wouldn't want to drop the phone. Gotta keep you priorities in order.


Nice little squall, wasn't it?

 

[lucky9]

I don't think you understand what the scientific process is that is being used.
These 'as dangerous as a drunk' statements are based on tests. Done in laboratories under strict guidelines. Those tests are peer reviewed. If you don't know any academics I want to tell you that they feel like they've gotten a gold star if they can poke holes in their fellows work. Those tests you can take to the bank. They are solid. Not some 'commentators' bull**** meanderings on the radio or TV. Lush Rimbaugh, Rachael Madow and the others do not deal in facts all of the time.

As for the lack of bodies. Really? You're going to tell me and others that air bags, crash-resistant construction, better brakes and suspension don't make a huge difference? Really? Better highway design? Really?

Or is this about the Aliens? Or are the Ruskies acting up again?. Maybe the Communist Chinese? Wait, I've got it. The North Koreans! Those devils!. Or maybe it the Unions or the John Birchers?

No my friend you've been duped by someone. Those tests are not rigged.
As for the baby argument, I'd grant that they are as distracting as a phone at times. But it's a specious argument based on the lack of considering the amount of time involved. Besides the last time I checked babies were not considered hardware. Nor are they optional when they are yours.

And lastly the poke about hating phones. I have had a cell phone at my side for 15 years or so. I do not leave the house without it. If I do forget it I will turn around and go back and get it. I love my cell. I don't use it a lot. I find that for some reason I do not need to be talking to someone while standing in line at the Theater or while shopping at the store. Or while driving. If I receive a call while driving I will call back when not driving. Not at a light or stop sign. In a parking lot.

These things are dangerous when used in a vehicle by a driver. Period. They can be dangerous when used by someone else if the call involves the driver. That's why they call the driver a driver. Cause that's what they're supposed to be doing. The miniscule percentage of people that can both talk or text while driving should not be allowed to influence good policy. We have quite enough trouble from impaired driving from alcohol. We don't need another way to cause mayhem.
When asked the average driver will almost always say that they are a good driver. It's those other people that are dangerous. This is a well-known psychological phenomenon. It's also normal. It's also untrue most of the time.

 

[DrMoab]

The use of cell phones in cars have out paced good highway design, smarter restraint systems and crush zones by about a million times yet the statistics doesn't show the increase in accidents by that amount.

I'm sure if they did studies on all forms of distracted driving they would find them all just as dangerous yet they don't, or at least they don't make the news like cell phone studies do.

 

[lucky9]

I wouldn't argue that. However when you take into account number of miles or time that phones are used, 30-40% of drivers are the equivalent of drunk sometime during a normal 24 hour period.
This is the problem with phones. Everyone has one, while not everyone has a bottle.

And I'm sorry but the equating of use of cell phones with highway design or automobile design is really not applicable. Even so, I'd say that highway design and automobile design are the only reason that the death toll hasn't been considerably higher. (I will note here that deaths are actually down per mile traveled. All due to automobile design enhancements that the auto companies fought tooth and nail to prevent. If they had prevailed the death toll would be considerably higher with the advent of ubiquitous cell phone usage.)

I have no doubt that distracted driving is a major cause of accidents. You are not wrong there. I remember a highway trooper mentioning that there was no way a single car accident could be blamed on a bee....unless someone survived. And that happened more than he cared to hear.
Any distracted driving is a terrible risk for the driver and everyone else on the stretch of road that they are driving at the time. No argument there. Let's just see if we can eliminate the unnecessary distractions. I don't think you would want to eliminate babies in cars. Not going to happen. There are things that we can do and should do. Phones being used by drivers is not something that needs to be happening. It's just plain stupid and uncaring of your fellow man.

 

[Darky]

The use of cell phones in cars have out paced good highway design, smarter restraint systems and crush zones by about a million times yet the statistics doesn't show the increase in accidents by that amount.

I'm sure if they did studies on all forms of distracted driving they would find them all just as dangerous yet they don't, or at least they don't make the news like cell phone studies do.

Got studies to back that up? Every year, more older cars leave the road to be replaced by newer, safer ones. I guarantee you that has an effect. Your situation is a little different than most as a truck driver. You're always driving, pulling over isn't necessarily an option. However, for the majority of drivers out there, it just makes sense to pull over on the side of the road or in a parking lot to take a call. If I'm in traffic, I won't answer. I will answer on occasion when I'm the only vehicle around however.

 

[scottmcneal]

Hell i can't find my phone half the time.I lost it again this week.I think it is in the garage or the jeep doors, i was working on them this week.LOL.Don't need it,don't want it,can't stand it. I blast my radio so i can't hear people honking at me for driving to slow, you know the posted speed limit.