Hi everybody, Cheryl Knowlton coming at you with this week’s safety tip.
Okay, so this comes directly again from the National Association of Realtors, amazing course, Safety Matters. This comes to you from page 34 and we are going to talk about texting and driving. Talking about the fact that we need to develop new habits.
The average time is 5 seconds
48 states, including the District of Columbia, have banned texting and driving, I think, for obvious reasons, but there’s an amazing statistic that I want to share with you. I want to make sure I get it exactly right. I’m actually going to read it to you right from this cute little text box on page 34.
Are you ready? Research by Virginia Tech Transportation Institute found that five seconds, five seconds, is the average time that your eyes are off the road while texting. I know you think it’s a lot faster than that. You probably think that you’re the exception and that you can do it a lot faster.
Not true. Check this out. When traveling at 55 miles while texting and driving, that’s enough time to cover the length of a football field blindfolded. That is a really, really long way to go in just five seconds. That is crazy to me.
She will never drive again
Just last night, I found out that my husband’s cousin, his wife was hit head on by an individual who was texting and driving in the state of Texas. She will never be able to drive again as a result of the effects of that accident.
We have got to stop doing that. You have people who love you, who want you to come home safely. You do not want the guilt associated with causing a horrible accident, a fatal accident, any accident of any kind. It could potentially kill a dog, kill a person or kill you. That would be absolutely tragic and devastating.
When you’re driving, please set your phone, most phones have a setting that you can set it to “I’m driving right now, “if you’re texting me, I’ll text you back.” Please make sure that you employ that on your phone. I don’t care what kind of a device you have, put your phone away, so that you can focus on the task at hand, focus on your driving and not on texting.
And that is your tip for the day. Hopefully, you can take this information, utilize it, I’d love for you to comment on any thoughts that you have. Share it with others who you feel like need this information because that’s an easy one, this is low hanging fruit that we can all utilize and be safer on the road.