Wood County Safe Communities announced today that there have been four fatal crashes in Wood County for calendar year 2016, compared to two for the same time period in 2015.
In an effort to make our roads safer, Wood County Safe Communities is continuing to promote the dangers of distracted driving. Wood County Safe Communities has pledged its support to help spread the message that distracted drivers are not only a danger to themselves, but everyone else on the road.
“We all know that talking on our cell phones while driving is distracting, but that doesn’t stop most people from continuing to do it,” said Sandy Wiechman, Coordinator for Wood County Safe Communities. “Our efforts are intended to educate our community about the dangers of cell phone use and other distractions while driving. We hope that once people see the startling statistics and realize every danger involved, they will change their driving habits to help protect themselves, their families, and others on the road.”
In 2015 in Wood County, there were 6,500 total crashes: 323 of those involved some type of Distracted Driving with a reported 45 injury crashes. The same time period for Ohio saw 20,000 Distracted Driving Crashes with 3,500 injury crashes and 15 deaths. That is 15 too many.
The national mobilization to stop distracted driving focuses on ways to change the behavior of drivers through legislation, enforcement, public awareness, and education – the same activities that have curbed drunk driving and increased seat belt use.
“Every driver in Wood County has a role in this effort,” said Ms. Wiechman. “However, we especially want to reach out to parents with teen drivers because we know that statistically, the under-20 age group had the highest proportion of distracted drivers involved in fatal crashes.”
Our goal is simple – we need work together to save lives by ending Distracted Driving.
