Smartphones are killing Americans, but nobody?s counting

[Old School]

Bloomberg Kyle Stock, Lance Lambert, and David Ingold<time abp="365" datetime="2017-10-22T23:50:00.000Z" data-always-show="true">1 hr ago


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/techn...y’s-counting/ar-AAtQOp7?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=HPDHP

A VERY INTERESTING READ... worth your time...90 seconds tops


Smartphones are killing Americans, but nobody?s counting

Jennifer Smith doesn?t like the term ?accident.? It implies too much chance and too little culpability.



A ?crash? killed her mother in 2008, she insists, when her car was broadsided by another vehicle while on her way to pick up cat food. The other driver, a 20-year-old college student, ran a red light while talking on his mobile phone, a distraction that he immediately admitted and cited as the catalyst of the fatal event.



?He was remorseful,? Smith, now 43, said. ?He never changed his story.?



Yet in federal records, the death isn?t attributed to distraction or mobile-phone use. It?s just another line item on the grim annual toll taken by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration [NHTSA]?one of 37,262 that year. Three months later, Smith quit her job as a realtor and formed Stopdistractions.org, a nonprofit lobbying and support group. Her intent was to make the tragic loss of her mother an anomaly.



To that end, she has been wildly unsuccessful. Nine years later, the problem of death-by-distraction has gotten much worse.

Over the past two years, after decades of declining deaths on the road, U.S. traffic fatalities surged by 14.4 percent. In 2016 alone, more than 100 people died every day in or near vehicles in America, the first time the country has passed that grim toll in a decade. ..............










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[Penguinfan]

We need an answer to this problem, and self accountability just isn't it. People don't think it's a distraction to them, THEY can handle it.

Hell, we've had members of this forum say exactly that, that they are capable of texting and driving without it being a risk and they have no intention of quitting.

It's sad and it's killing people, and nobody seems to care.

 

[Scrapman]

tell me about delivering food 8.5 hours and pedestrians looking down at phones crossing major 4 way intersections it's a wonder they aint hit daily by drivers.

bikers riding bikes texting with both hands in traffic

drivers on highways omfg help meeeeeeeee please get the fuck away from me.

:scared

 

[ImFeklhr]

Bloomberg
[/B]Over the past two years, after decades of declining deaths on the road, U.S. traffic fatalities surged by 14.4 percent. In 2016 alone, more than 100 people died every day in or near vehicles in America, the first time the country has passed that grim toll in a decade. ..............

This is one of those "keep an eye on it" statistics. While the rate of "fatalities per mile driven" has have jumped the past couple years they are still 50% less than 1974, 30% better than 1997, and even 10% better than 1997.
The lowest recorded "fatalities per mile driven" EVER was in 2014, and there were plenty of smartphones around then.

People should be more careful, but some of it is just hysteria.

 

[Penguinfan]

This is one of those "keep an eye on it" statistics. While the rate of "fatalities per mile driven" has have jumped the past couple years they are still 50% less than 1974, 30% better than 1997, and even 10% better than 1997.
The lowest recorded "fatalities per mile driven" EVER was in 2014, and there were plenty of smartphones around then.

People should be more careful, but some of it is just hysteria.

You have to credit safety enhancements of newer vehicles for the decrease in fatalities. It sure isn't because people are any less distracted with their phone in their hand.

 

[Old School]

You have to credit safety enhancements of newer vehicles for the decrease in fatalities. It sure isn't because people are any less distracted with their phone in their hand.

that's for damn sure..