Summer is a dangerous time for anyone to be on the roadway. Increased traffic from summer travelers, summer parties and celebrations perhaps involving alcohol, and other factors all contribute to this fact. With these increased risks and additional distractions, it is not surprising that the summer months are the most dangerous for less experienced teen drivers, as well. Teen driver safety should be of the utmost concern for parents. A recent article discussed the dangers posed to teens driving on roadways across Florida in the summer.
Dangers
Statistics show that the summer months between Memorial Day and Labor Day are the deadliest for teenage drivers as well as teen passengers. For many teens, summer months mean spending more time with friends, being out of school, and maybe even staying out later than normal curfew time. These factors may attribute to the approximate 26 percent rise in teen traffic-deaths across the nation during the summer months, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In addition, teens’ inexperience behind the wheel plus having multiple passengers in their vehicle can easily lead to disaster.
Safe Driving
Teens must be encouraged to follow basic tenets of safe driving while operating a vehicle at any time, but especially during the more dangerous summer months. This includes keeping hands on the wheel, eyes on the road, and, most importantly, focusing attention on the task of driving the car. Otherwise, teens should understand that one mistake or bad decision can have consequences that are devastating in the short-term and can continue to have a negative impact on them for the rest of their lives.
Unfortunately, there are numerous accounts and examples of teen drivers who make a wrong decision that has tragic consequences. Crashes involving speeding, distracted driving, and losing control of a vehicle happen all too often and cause serious injuries and death. Many times, teens may lack the maturity to understand the gravity of the effects even a momentary lapse in judgment can have, which is why raising awareness about the dangers is so important.
Parents, too, should play an active role in monitoring and instructing their children’s driving. This may involve enrolling teens in driver training classes or getting them other types of formal instruction. Parents should institute rules for driving that teens must follow along with consequences for breaking them. Some of the recommended guidelines in this area include always obeying traffic laws, communicating the teen’s whereabouts to his or her parents, limiting the number of passengers a teen driver can ride with, and never getting into the car with someone who has been drinking.
Personal Injury Attorney
While teens may be more likely to be involved in a crash than adult drivers, the fact is that a car accident can happen anywhere, at any time, to anyone. If you have been injured in a car accident due to another driver’s negligence, you may have important rights that deserve protection. The experienced personal injury attorneys at Hoffman, Larin & Agnetti, P.A. have years of successful experience representing personal injury clients in Dade, Broward, and Monroe Counties in Florida. Contact us today to schedule a consultation to discuss your case.
