Texting Teen Driver in Florida Rear-Ends Police Car
Incident Proves Danger of Teen Driving Distractions
A Tampa Bay paper reported that a 17-year-old girl, skipping school and out on a joy ride with friends, got into trouble when she ran into a police officer – literally.
The teen driver apparently became distracted while texting and bore down on the back end of a patrol car.
Texting has officially become more popular than cell phone calls. In fact, it’s been stomping the competition for a couple of years now. Nielsen Mobile, a communications research firm associated with The Nielsen Company, said U.S. wireless subscribers average 357 texts a month, versus 204 phone calls.
Nielsen looked at the wireless bills of a volunteer sample of 50,000 subscribers and noted activities such as text messages, favorite games and ringtones.
The numbers get more interesting when Nielsen shows results by age group. Teens, ages 13 to 17, send or receive 1,742 texts per month; more than any other age category. (The next-closest age group, ages 18-24, was far behind. They averaged 790 texts a month.) Put that statistic behind 4,000 pounds of speeding steel, glass and gasoline, and you’ve got trouble waiting to happen.
That Florida teen driving disaster should feel lucky she got away with only $3,000 in damage, a ticket, and probably a good grounding from her parents.
Teen Driving Distractions
A second company called Vlingo backs up this trend. In its survey, one in four drivers acknowledged that they send text messages while driving. Again, the numbers were broken up by age group and teen drivers came out on top. Sixty percent of people in the age group 16 to 19 said that they combine texting and driving.
Allstate Insurance does an annual study of teen driving habits. In the most recent, last fall, volunteers took up posts at 20 high schools and logged distracting behaviors exhibited by teen drivers.
The No. 1 teen driving distraction was use of the cell phone. Other front runners were:
- Turning on or raising volume of the radio or other music devices.
- Passengers engaged in conversation with the teen driver.
- Teen driving while eating or drinking.
Text messaging is a consumer communications hit, because it’s fast and convenient; but all that finger tapping takes a motorist’s attention away from the road. Accident statistics that result from this teen driving habit have captured the attention of some state lawmakers.
The Illinois Senate recently passed legislation that would ban driving while texting. If the House follows suit, it will be up to the governor to decide. One lawmaker said it was the first step toward a complete state ban on driver use of hand-held cell phones.
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Tags: Teen Driving, Texting
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