Fatality a wake-up call
As Calgary police investigate whether distracted driving was to blame for a car crash that killed a young man, the Alberta Motor Association says drivers are reporting seeing people chatting on their phones or texting behind the wheel as often as they did before the province’s distracted driving legislation took effect.
The 18-year-old died when he drove his 2012 Ford Focus into the path of an oncoming tractor-trailer unit on Highway 8 on the city’s west side late Tuesday afternoon.
Sgt. Colin Foster, head of the police collision reconstruction unit, said investigators are still working to determine the cause of the collision, but one avenue being looked into is distracted driving.
“We’re looking at his cellphone, we’re looking at his positioning inside the vehicle, we’re looking at the radio inside the vehicle, any of those things that may have caused him to be distracted,” said Foster.
Police have already ruled out speed and alcohol as factors in the crash.
Foster said distracted driving can have serious consequences.
A driver doing 100 km/h on Deerfoot Trail travels about 30 metres per second, he said. A lot can happen in 30 metres when a driver is not paying attention.
“If we are able to categorically state that distracted driving is an issue or was the cause of this collision ... this should be taken as a wake-up call for everybody,” said Foster.
Police also ask that any witnesses who saw the vehicle come forward.
If it is distracted driving, which was the focus of new provincial legislation last year that gave police the authority to hand out $172 tickets for talking or texting on a handheld device, it would be the first such death in the city since it became law.
AMA spokesman Don Szarko said in the months after the legislation took effect on Sept. 1, 2011, compliance rose temporarily, but it is now back to the way it was before that date.
“According to the drivers, we’re actually getting more complaints from people that are seeing more people driving while distracted. Driving while using a cellphone, driving while texting is a huge issue being reported,” said Szarko.
“The general perception based on the phone calls and e-mails and the public sentiment out there is that people are back to their old habits again. There’s just as much distracted driving going on now as there was before the law.”