Teens prove distracting passengers
A SHOCKING 85% of high school students admit to being a distracting passenger, prompting RACQ to issue a wake-up message to teens about the realities of inattention.
RACQ spokeswoman Lauren Ritchie said the research highlighted the alarming issue among teenagers.
“Distraction is the fastest-growing problem on our roads. While the dangers of distracted driving are well known, the responsibility passengers play in not pulling the focus off the task of driving needs a lot of work,” she said.
“It might seem harmless to dance along to a song on the radio, offer some food to the driver or hold up your phone to show a photo - but for the driver to look away for even two seconds when driving at 60kmh, he or she can travel up to 33 metres completely blind.
“Sadly young drivers, particularly males 17 to 24-years-old, are in the highest risk age group for fatalities. We need teens to recognise the dangers and to do everything they can to stay safe on the roads.”
U Can Drive driving instructor Rick Armitage said while teaching young students how to drive in Toowoomba he created a number of different environments with a range of distraction levels.
“When we first start out with a student it is a very focused environment but as lessons progress we start to display more distracting behaviours such as holding different conversations to make sure they can cope in different circumstances.
“We build up their skills and I want them to know they can ignore me and focus on driving, just like they can with their friends. I’d rather them ignore me than crash.”
Mr Armitage said while driving, the full ownership was on the driver.
“Although the friends can be the distracting ones, the driver needs to take full responsibility of the car,” he said.