Stay safe. Drive safe.

Jasmin
Vela

31
March 2020

Driving
is no longer a privilege it is a need. Almost every American learns
how to drive because vehicles can transport them mostly everywhere.
This being said, it is crucial for every driver to learn how to
prevent any car accidents. This way, once people have learned how to
keep themselves safe they may teach others how to stay safe while on
the road, as well.

What
you can do in order to prevent any car accidents, are the following:
(1) Silence your phone, for every notification takes part of one’s
attention from the road and focuses it on the possible content of the
notification. (2) Before igniting the car, arrange all the vehicle’s
mirrors in a specific position that allows the driver to acknowledge
the space and movement around their vehicle. This allows anyone to
have a broad and complete view of any hazards. (3) Lower the volume
of your music or play no music at all. While music can have a
positive impact on our lives, it is not recommended to blast music in
one’s car when driving, since it can potentially distract anyone
from the road, traffic lights or even traffic itself. (4) Give
yourself time before you plan on entering a new lane or a new street.
A driver must always turn to their blindspot much before they
actually emerge into the lane besides them. Many have committed the
mistake of only revising the mirrors when there is always a
possibility of a car being right next to them.

I,
personally, have been in car accidents and they definitely are life
threatening, both to the driver and the passengers: I was driving
home from school with a friend, and we were listening to loud music,
that did not seem to be a problem. I thought I could handle the
lyrics and the wheel at the same time, and I did. What I could not
handle was the phone that my friend handed to me. He was eager to
show me a message he had recently gotten and in an attempt to give
some attention to my friend and be a good one, I read the message
while I turned a curve. I thought I had enough spatial intelligence
to do so, until I felt my face hit against the steering wheel. I
looked around and I realized that I had crashed against a parked car.
It’s all my fault,
I thought. But it was not all on me.

Many
drivers have driven irresponsibly without even knowing it, and many
passengers do not realize that they, can potentially, contribute to
the prevention or the occurrence of car accidents. One of the most
important things to remember when driving is that anything, literally
anything, that distracts us from the wheel, the speedometer and the
road can always wait.

We
all have the responsibility to take care of the lives in a vehicle
when its wheels are moving quickly on the road.

Stay
safe. Drive safe.