Simulator shows students distracted driving risks
JACKSON, Tenn. — The Save a Life tour made a stop at Jackson Central-Merry Early College High Monday morning to warn students about the dangers of distracted driving.
“Kids already know all the pieces that make up safe driving,” said Clay Martin, tour manager for the national Save a Life tour. “What we really try to address more is why we keep having this conversation.”
There are two simulators for this activity. One is in a virtual reality headset, where the system mimics the slower reaction times a drunk driver would have.
The other is newer and involves texting, which became a problem more recently.
“That’s when we added the second component to address a growing and still growing issue to this day,” Martin said.
The students on Monday aren’t at driving age yet, but even they were surprised at how something like texting could be that much of a distraction.
“I only got so many in, and then I did end up crashing into a pole,” said Cayla Williams, a freshman at JCM Early College High.
WBBJ 7 Eyewitness News reporter Clint Eiland gave the simulator a whirl, but it didn’t go so well.
“I always ask people, can you even think about how many times you’ve buckled a seatbelt in the last couple of weeks? Everything you do in a car will build into a habit that’s automatic, including ignoring or picking up the phone,” Martin said. “At the end of the day, that’s a choice people made.”
“Once you get used to it and nothing happens, and it’s something you’re okay with, it can start to continue,” Williams said. “That’s what the big danger is when you’re driving.”
The program typically goes to about 300 to 400 schools in a year, hoping they can get kids to stay away from bad driving habits.
“If I let myself make that bad choice, I could cause pain to another family in a way I couldn’t imagine. Whether I intended to or not, doesn’t matter. I let it happen. That’s something that helps keep me focused on what the right decision to make is,” Martin said.
According to the U.S.-based National Safety Council, cell phone use while driving leads to 1.6 million crashes every year.
