Gentlemen, This young man is dead. He is a friend-of-a-friend's son. He died while texting and driving. Please show this to your children. I did not know him, but know of him. He was a good boy who came back and went to class here in temporary trailers used after Katrina and was the first graduating class. He had his entire life before him and now he is no more. A mom and dad, family and friends are without his company. This happened due him TEXTING while driving. Believe it or not ,I'm told his family takes comfort that it was a one car accident. Please tell your kids once again, as young ones never understand the consequences. I really don't know what else to say, but this is the reality. Thank you.... http://obits.nola.com/obituaries/nola/obituary.aspx?n=michael-j-morris&pid=144194337 Thank you...
I wrote an article for the newspaper a while back about texting and driving, it really is dangerous. I make it a general rule that I put my phone in the glove when I get in the car, routine just like putting on my seat belt.
Good idea, I work for a company that does not allow cell phone use while driving, it has done wonders for reduced accidents and safety.
there is abolutely NO reason why anyone should be yapping on a cellphone nor texting while behind the wheel of a moving vehicle. we all manged to survive without cellphones prior to their invention. surely we can survive without them while driving.
Really sorry to hear about this kid. Its happend here not long ago too. Unfortunatly the cell phone is my main business line and I get calls on it all day while out on the road. I do make it a point whenever possible to pull over before taking notes or information from customers. I am a totaly Anti Txt'n guy. I feel it is a waist of time and energy. I hope this is just another fad that will fade away. On a pos note... I got a new GPS the other day and it has a blue tooth link that I can take my calls on it hands free. once I figure out how to use it I'll see if that works well for me.
Not long ago, CAR & DRIVER ren an article where they compared texting while driving with drinking and driving. Up to a certain blood alcohol level, texters actually did worse then drinkers! Interestingly, reading a text message seemed to be more distracting then sending one. As to hands free cell phones: It is what you are doing with your brain, not your hands, that is the problem. "Hands free" cell phones have never been demonstrated to be any safer then hand held phones. Having said all that; I am a licensed ham radio operator and have a 2 meter rig in my Buchev pickup. Occasionally I will use it with the truck in motion. It is not uncommon to hear or say: "I gotta drive now, I'll be back in a minute."
Up until my son went way overboard on his text messeges and I got a cellphone bill for $480, I didn't even have it on my phone. Didn't want it. So, as a result of the high phone bill I upgraded our plan to include unlimited texts but the only option was to do it on all three phones. Ok, so now I have it, and on my last trip up north my wife sends me a text to which I tried to reply. I had no idea how difficult and distracting that was to do while driving. I will never do that again. Too dangerous. I haven't had an accident since I was 18 years old, which would be nearly 38 years ago and I want to keep it that way. Texting and cellphone use while driving should be outlawed IMO. The problem I see with that is it would be difficult to enforce even if the police wanted to enforce it, which I don't see happening.
I've been involved in the highway business for over twenty years. Distracted drivers come in all shapes and sizes as well as causes. Texting, eating, shaving, reading, cell phone, turning to look and yell at the kids in the back... At 70 mph people move much faster than they think. Look at all the Work Zone workers killed this summer alone. Cell phones without a bluetooth have been banned in IL for several years now. Yet a few weeks ago I picked up my sixth grade daughter from school. While sitting outside the school parking lot I counted 13 out of 16 Moms pulling in on the phone with the phone held to the heads. Those play dates for little Tommy and Julie are so important. According to local law enforcement its almost impossible to enforce.
Cellphones, Texting. Even staring at a GPS like a Tom Tom or Garmin is trouble waiting to happen. We will have a whole generation of directionally challenged people as the result of no one wanting to look at a map anymore. I'm getting old I guess. I don't understand the whole needing a GPS thing. "In my day!" I get more phone calls from customers that are lost while using their GPS asking directions on how to find us then ever before. Sorry, didn't mean to digress.
An instructor from Denver once told me that he was driving down Hwy 470 in Denver He sees a car weaving all over the road. One he gets past the it. He sees the driver frosting a cake. :shock: :shock: my son has just moved to FL to go to school and he says his friends from WY don't understand why he doesn't answer the phone when he is driving. DUH Tim
Michigan has a new law - texting while driving is a primary offense, $100 first time, $200 after that. I'm convinced that confiscation or a monthly surcharge on cell phone bills would be more effective. I do have a Motorola bluetooth stereo headset. It's almost useless in the Buick at highway speeds for phone calls (summertime with the windows open). It works pretty good in a closed, quiet car, but I do think the distraction is mental and not physical. I try to keep calls short, even on long road trips.
Sorry to hear about this friend. We have three teenage boys that are new to driving. They all have went to the manditory drivers training courses and passed. We talk about the reasons why they shouldn't text and drive along with other distracting habits. It was not until I installed a Janus Drive Camera that recorded their driving habits of our oldest. Now, he knew the camera was there. He was recorded texting, driving over the speed limits, inattentive driving, etc. The camera was at first not accepted. But after explaining that this is a tool to help in making them better drivers, they accepted it. Before school ended, he was pulled over by a State Patrol officer. The officer said he didn't stop at the stop light and yield to oncoming traffic. So.............after reviewing the video that is recorded in High Definition, both forward and back, has audio, GPS, speed information, etc., we determined this needed to be disputed. He did stop and look up the road for oncoming traffic, and after waiting for about 6 seconds pulled out cautiously into the lane. The State Patrol officer changed lanes in the intersection and behind our son. Changing lanes in an intersection is not allowed under WA State law. So hopefully he will prevail in this case. For us, this camera has improved the driving skills of our boys and even myself. Ii can't imagine being without one now.
Sorry to hear this. My phone calls rarely last more than a minute long. Last month, my bill showed that I used 38mins for the entire month. I don't text.
There was a funeral last week here in Iowa for a girl from our town, who lost control of her car while texting her boyfriend. No seat belt on so she was ejected from the car and died at the scene. 18 years old and what a senseless way to die. Kids today are no different than we were as kids. We ALL thought we were invinceble, and nothing bad will happen. its a different world today, and kids have alot more to deal with.
That whole texting thing confuses me anyway. More often than not they are texting back and forth when they could just call?? I suppose it's a sign of my age but I don't even understand the whole texting thing instead of a call 99 percent of the time. I know it has a place, but it's used instead of talking. I am not saying that kids yapping on the phone while driving is great, but it is better and you can use a hands free device so that your eyes stay on the road.
I know. I've questioned the logic of that myself. If we want to get a hold of our son, and we call his cell phone we won't get a response even if we leave a voice mail message. If we text him, we get an immediate response.
It is a damn shame that he past away my heart goes out to his family. Most of us are or have been guilty of talking on the phone or texting. We shouldn't as we all know the dangers are there to us and to others on the road. As a learning tool if you want to scare the daylights out of your kids who are new drivers regarding the dangers of texting click on this video short. It is NOT for the faint hearted, it is very graphic and sad but straight to the point on the extreme dangers of texting and driving. Showed my two kids (17 & 16 years), they need to realize the dangers also a bit of a wake up call for myself. Watch it first, and I would recommend showing your kids afterwards. http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=64989
Talking on a cell while driving is not as bad as it is made out to be, but good thing for the blue tooth setup. Now, texting while driving would be a BIG no-no. Typing on a laptop/computer while driving is a BIG no-no,too. NO ONE should be allowed to do that.
Dale, I'm 30 and wonder this. I know how to read a map or get myself un-lost. but my wife who's 27 can't.
lemme see.... you have only one hand on the wheel ..... one ear (and 99 percent of your brain) focused intently on a conversation inside the phone and not your car's surroundings.... and one eye intermittently peripherally blocked by a cell phone or your hand. if you are traveling 66fps (i believe at 45 mph, but that may be wrong) and it takes a child or animal less than 1 second to dart in front of you from behind a parked car or whatever.... so if you are less than 66 ft from where they dart, you have WAY less than 1 second to STOP. hmmmm. on my old job i used to drive 7 mostly non-highway hours per day on most days for 9 years. cell talkers have no idea how often they are dangerous. i would see/avoid 2-20 dangerous traffic violations per hour while i was at work. all the driving i did i never had took a cell phone call while the car was moving or on the road ....and never had an accident. i dont think its coincidence because my other 2 co-workers had(caused) accidents about bi-annually since they were employeed in the last 3 years of my employment....and im sure that on any given day im no better of a driver than they are when they are not on the phone. and its a shame to lose so many lives from it.
