What is an ‘own car crash’? It is a crash involving no other vehicle except the driver’s own – when he crashes his vehicle into a tree, a lamp-post, a traffic signal or the road-dividing metal fence. Or rides into a sidewalk or roundabout.
But many readers must be wondering why one should do so unless under the influence of alcohol. Good thought. But all the same, a good number of drivers, some with many years of experience, are lately to be found crashing their own cars, which is a new pattern emerging on the streets of Bahrain.
The reason is the emergence of new technology that allows one to have the world on one’s fingertips —the mobile phone and the gadgetry hidden inside its entrails.
The consequence is that nowadays quite a few people – especially the young – have their foot on the accelerator, elbows on the steering, eyes on the mobile phone and fingers sending messages or scanning YouTube or other video clips. That is, if they are not talking on the mobile.
The result is, such drivers tend to not only slow down even when the road ahead of them has no traffic, or continue to remain static even when the red light has turned green, or are unable to pay attention to any blaring of horns, being deeply engrossed in their own little doings on the mobile. Such visual and mental distractions make for a deadly combination and also lead to cases of road rage when the law-abiding and properly-driving vehicle-owner is justifiably outraged by the cavalier attitude of the errant driver.
And when their eyes are not on the road, which is as good as driving with eyes shut, own-car crashes are bound to happen. “Everyone wants to stay connected at all times but drivers have to realize that a three-second glance at a phone makes one blind for 90 yards. That is the whole length of a football field and anything can happen during that time,” Traffic Culture Director Lt-Col. Osama Mohammed Bahar said in a recent interview.
He also said that the social media application Snapchat had made things worse. “This application allows users to see pictures sent by their contacts for a few seconds before they disappear. So it is imperative they see them. Here lies the danger. Those few seconds can be critical,” he said.
He also blamed radio stations promoting their social media pages, adding that presenters often asked people to ‘like’ a certain picture or video on Facebook to win a prize. But since the majority of listeners to the radio are vehicle drivers, they are tempted to play along and take a look at the picture or the video posted online but at the cost of crashing their own vehicles.
The lesson is to keep your mobile away from you while driving.