nissan supports driving safety programs

By Jayne O'donnellUSA TODAY

HOLLYWOOD, Fla. — It was adouble date like countless others:Two teenage girls and theirteenage boyfriends, with plans tosee a movie on a summer night.

But this one ended in grief.Sixteen-year-old Gerald Millerswerved his sport-utility vehicleto miss a car stalled on Interstate95. The SUV, traveling about 78mph, rolled five times. The boyswere injured. The girls — CaseyHersch, 16, and Lauren Gorham,15 — were thrown from the SUVand died.

To many who knew the victims,the crash seemed like a cruel actof fate, a freak tragedy beyondanyone's control. But it fit a com-mon formula for teen deaths onthe USA's roadways: Put a 16-year-old boy at the wheel of anSUV. Add two or three teens,including at least one other boy.Send them out at night. Finally, letthem travel fast — and unbelted.

Those common factors emergedwhen USA TODAY examined all

the deadly crashes involving 16-to-19-year-old drivers in 2003.About 3,500 teenagers died inteen-driven vehicles in the USAthat year — a death toll that topsthat of any disease or injury forteens. The South proved to be thedeadliest region.

More than two-thirds of fatalsingle-vehicle teen crashesinvolved nighttime driving or atleast one passenger age 16 to 19.Nearly three-fourths of the driv-ers in those crashes were male.And 16-year-old drivers were theriskiest of all. Their rate ofinvolvement in fatal crashes wasnearly five times that of driversages 20 and older, according to theInsurance Institute for HighwaySafety.

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New medical research helpsexplain why. The part of the brainthat weighs risks and controlsimpulsive behavior isn't fullydeveloped until about age 25,according to the NationalInstitutes of Health. Some statelegislators and safety activistsquestion whether 16-year-olds

Deadly teen autocrashes show a pattern

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© Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co., Inc.

The most dangerous drivers: 16-year-olds. And mostdeadly single-vehicle teen crashes involve night driv-ing or at least one passenger age 16 to 19.

CCrraasshh vviiccttiimmss:: Casey Hersch,top, and Lauren Gorham diedin the crash in 2003.

Special report: The hazards of teen driving

should be licensed to drive.

Sixteen-year-olds are far worsedrivers than 17-, 18- or 19-year-olds,statistics show. Tellingly, New Jersey,which has long barred 16-year-oldsfrom having unrestricted driver'slicenses, for years has had one of thelowest teen fatality rates in the USA.

Other jurisdictions, too, havefound the only sure way to cut theteen death toll is to limit unsuper-vised driving by 16-year-olds. Sevenstates and the District of Columbiadon't give unrestricted licenses toanyone under 18. In Britain andGermany, teens can't drive until ages17 and 18, respectively.

Rules that restrict driving at 16have clearly had a positive effect, theinsurance institute says. As the pro-portion of 16-year-olds in the USAwith driver's licenses has declinedfrom a decade ago, so has the pro-portion of 16-year-olds involved infatal crashes. But the rate amongthose who are licensed has shownno improvement.

On an average day in the USA, 10teenagers are killed in teen-drivenvehicles. Some days are far worse.Crashes that occurred on one of thedeadliest days of 2003 — Nov. 1 —killed 26 teens.

The death toll could swell in com-ing years. A record 17.5 million teenswill be eligible to drive once thepeak of the "baby boomlet" hitsdriving age by the end of this decade— 1.3 million more than were eligi-ble in 2000.

Horrific as teenage deaths are, thecollective response from their fami-lies is often one of grim acceptance.Jeffrey Runge, a former emergencyroom doctor who's now head of theNational Highway Traffic SafetyAdministration, shudders to recallhow some parents reacted to hear-ing their teens had just died in acrash.

"It was amazing how many peoplewould say, 'I guess it was just histime,' " Runge says.

Runge acknowledges that safetyadvocates have failed to adequatelypublicize what's known about whyteens die in crashes. State laws oftendon't restrict behavior that's linkedto many teen fatalities.

Nearly all states have some form of"graduated licensing" programs thatlimit driving privileges for newteenage drivers. In some states, therules restrict whom teens can trans-port and when they can drive. Teenfatalities have declined in states withthe programs, according to a newreport by the insurance institute.

But the institute and other safetyexperts note that despite those pro-grams, thousands of teens are stillbeing killed on the roads. The rea-son, they say: Graduated licensingrules are poorly enforced and oftenriddled with loopholes.

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A review of crash statistics findsclear patterns. The risk to teen livesrises when:


16-year-old drivers have highest fatal crash rateTeen drivers, especially 16-year-olds, have significantly higher rates of involvementin fatal crashes than older drivers. Fatal crash involvements per 100 million milestraveled, by driver age:

Sources: USA TODAY analysis by Barbara Hansen of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System data; Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

Traffic crashes leading cause of teen deathsLeading causes of death for 16-to-19-year-olds in 2002 as apercentage of all deaths:

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Motor vehiclecrashes

Homicide Suicide Malignanttumors

Heartdisease

41%

14%11%

5% 3%

Teen drivers in fatal crashes are more likely than older drivers to make driving errors such as speeding or running off the road. They are also more likely to roll theirvehicles, to be carrying two or more passengers and to have single-vehicle crashes.

Errors are more common in teen-driver crashes

Running off the roadExcessive speed Single vehicleRollover Vehicle with two or morepassengers of any age

60%

40%

20%

0

By Julie Snider, USA TODAY

Source: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Based on crashes April 2001-March 2002.

16171819

20-2425-2930-5960-69

70 and older

9.38.3

6.57.2

4.32.3

1.61.6

4.1

16 17 18 19 20 and olderDriver age:Percentage of 2003 fatal crashes1 among each age group that involved:

1 – Single crash can include more than one factor

uu AA 1166--yyeeaarr--oolldd iiss aatt tthhee wwhheeeell..Along with their higher rate ofinvolvement in fatal crashes, 16-year-olds make driving errors,exceed speed limits, run off roadsand roll their vehicles over at higherrates than do older drivers involvedin fatal crashes.

"They're the youngest, so they areall inexperienced at that age," saysAllan Williams, the institute's formerchief scientist. "They're pushing thelimits, trying out new things . . . andthey don't really have the controlsover risk-taking in terms of judg-ment and decision-making."

uuTThheeyy''rree rriiddiinngg wwiitthh ootthheerr tteeeennss..Forty percent of 16-year-old driversinvolved in deadly single-vehiclecrashes in 2003 had one or more teenpassengers. Teens' risk of dying near-ly doubles with the addition of onemale passenger, the insurance insti-tute says. It more than doubles withtwo or more young men in the car.

Jackie Swanson, 18, had two pas-sengers — her 16-year-old cousin,Thomas, and a 17-year-old friend,James Newton — and was drivingabout 90 mph when she lost controlof a Firebird convertible in a 2003Louisiana crash. Swanson struckanother car, scaled a guardrail andwent airborne across several lanes oftraffic. The three unbelted teenswere ejected and killed.

Thomas Swanson, Thomas' fatherand Jackie's uncle, says the lossforced him to relapse temporarilyinto cocaine addiction. "I was tryingto bury the deaths with the drugs,"Swanson says.

uu TThheeyy''rree iinn tteeeenn--ddrriivveenn ccaarrss aafftteerrddaarrkk.. Teen drivers are three times aslikely as drivers 20 and older to beinvolved in fatal crashes between 9p.m. and 6 a.m., the institute says,and 16-year-olds die at night attwice the rate as in the daytime. It'sharder to see at night, so it's harderto react quickly to obstacles.Inexperienced drivers are more vul-nerable to making errors after dark.

Jennifer McElmurray, of Evans, Ga.,who turned 16 in February 2003,was driving that June when she lostcontrol of her car and hit a stand oftrees. Her car was engulfed inflames. McElmurray survived thecrash, but her two male passengers,ages 16 and 17, died. The nighttimecurfew for new drivers was mid-night; the sheriff was called to thescene at 11:56 p.m.

uu TThhee yyoouunngg ddrriivveerr lloosseess ccoonnttrrooll..Driver error is involved in 77% offatal crashes involving 16-year-olddrivers but in less than 60% of crash-es with drivers 20 and older.

About a third of all 16-year-olddrivers and a quarter of 17-to-19-year-old drivers involved in fatalcrashes rolled their vehicles.Rollovers often occur when a driverovercorrects and runs off the road.Inexperienced teens are most likelyto do so.

On a July night in 2003, Jessie Bell,16, was following a car driven by herboyfriend on a Missouri highwaywith a 65-mph speed limit when shelost control. The vehicle rolled into aditch, and she died.

uu TThheeyy''rree iinn aann uunnssuuiittaabbllee vveehhiiccllee..Because they're in the age groupmost likely to be involved in a crash,teens should occupy vehicles leastlikely to roll and most protectivewhen they crash, highway safetyexperts say. Yet, teens often wind upin small cars, which are especiallyvulnerable when hit by larger vehi-cles, or in SUVs, which are moreprone to roll over.

Two years ago, Runge caused a stirwhen he noted he would never lethis inexperienced teens drive a vehi-cle with a two-star (out of five)rollover rating from the safetyadministration. Only SUVs and pick-ups score that low in the ratings.

Terry Khristian Rider, 16, died afterhe was partly ejected from the GMCSUV he was driving in a 2003 crashin Orangeburg, S.C. His uncle, JohnRider, says Terry borrowed the vehi-

cle to drive his girlfriend homebefore midnight. "Those things arekind of top-heavy, and it doesn't takea whole lot of correcting to rollthem," Rider says. "I think it's wrongfor people to let kids drive (SUVs)."

uu TThheeyy ddrriivvee iinn mmoorree ddaannggeerroouussrreeggiioonnss.. Eight of the 10 states withthe highest teen-driver fatal crash-involvement rates are in the South.Highway safety officials fromSouthern states, including Alabama,Louisiana and Mississippi, say laxenforcement of speeding or alcohollaws and many rural, tree-linedroads that provide little margin forerror make their states deadlier foryoung drivers.

Kim Proctor, Mississippi's highwaysafety chief, blames weak seat-beltlaws in her state, Florida andKentucky and difficulty in gettingmany pickup drivers and minoritiesto buckle up.

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Kathy Schaefer, the mother ofFlorida crash victim Casey Hersch,and Melissa Herberz, LaurenGorham's mother, had no idea of theodds their daughters were facing theJuly night they were killed.

"I was a very controlling parent,"Schaefer says. "But I never thoughtmy child would be killed in a car."

To this day, Schaefer frequentlystays in her bedroom all day, mourn-ing the loss of her only child.

The mothers didn't know that thevehicle their daughters were in atthe time — a Ford Explorer SportTrac SUV with a pickup bed — hadearned a low two-star governmentrollover rating. Nor did they recog-nize the risk the girls faced with a16-year-old boy driving several pas-sengers. Male teen drivers are about75% more likely than female teendrivers to be involved in fatal crash-es, the insurance institute says.

Florida had the fourth-worst teenfatal-crash rate in 2003. It isn't


among the 28 states that restricthow many passengers 16-year-old-drivers can have, and it's one of 30states that forbid police to stop driv-ers solely for not wearing safetybelts; none of the teens was belted.

Florida does have an 11 p.m. driv-ing curfew for 16- and 17-year-olddrivers. The crash occurred justafter 9 p.m.

Highway safety officials aroundthe USA complain that many statelegislators, pressured by parents,have refused to tighten laws to barteens from driving at night or fromhaving teen passengers, despiteclear evidence those factors sharplyraise the risk of teen deaths.

Safety officials note that of the 38states with nighttime drivingrestrictions, more than half don'tstart those restrictions until at leastmidnight — when, they say, mostyounger teens are not out.

"There's so much research thathas shown (graduated licensing)makes a huge difference that wehave been trying almost desperate-ly to get (our law) upgraded," saysAlabama traffic safety chief Rhonda

Pines. Alabama lets 16-year-oldsdrive after midnight if they'rereturning from a hunting or fishingtrip and have their parents' consent.The state also lets 16-year-olds haveup to three teen passengers, in addi-tion to family members.

There are also regional disparitiesin how alcohol and speeding prohi-bitions are treated. In Mississippi,where fatalities often occur on tree-lined roads, only one countyauthorizes sheriffs to use radarguns. Speeding laws are seldomenforced on those roads, Proctorsays.

Some states will license eventeens who got speeding ticketswhile driving with a learner's permit.

James Champagne, chairman ofthe national Governors HighwaySafety Association, laments what hecalls a casual attitude toward alco-hol abuse in his home state ofLouisiana. Yet Champagne, a formerstate police lieutenant colonel,notes it isn't easy to enforce gradu-ated licensing. "Police will look at itas a priority depending on whatimportance the public puts on it,"

says Champagne, the Louisiana gov-ernor's highway safety director.

Those who advocate graduatedlicensing say the laws assume par-ents will enforce them. But inter-views with safety officials and crashreports suggest parents often letteens skirt the laws, don't know therules or aren't aware their kids aredriving. The parents of at least twoteens killed in 2003 car crashesthought their kids were washing,not driving, the car.

"We don't have police officers onevery corner," Champagne says."Too many parents expect thepolice to be the parent."

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Gayle Bell was doing everythingthat seemed appropriate for a par-ent when Jessie died in her crash.But she no longer thinks 16-year-olds are old enough to drive. Jessiewas ejected from her ChevroletCavalier coupe in El Dorado Springs,Mo. Bell says the grieving "meltsyour body down."

Jessie got her license in March2003 and her car three months


One deadly day: anatomy of an accidentA frequent cause of crashes among the teen drivers on Nov. 1, 2003, one ofthe deadliest days for teens that year, was loss of control after overcorrecting.Here’s how a fatal crash involving driver Eric Nguyen, 16, and three teenpassengers in a 1999 Honda Accord unfolded on westbound E-470 in DouglasCounty, Colo., just after 9 p.m. It was Nguyen’s first unsupervised drive aftergetting his license.

Source: USA TODAY analysis by Anthony DeBarros

Common factorsIn the 24 fatal crashes involving teens onNov. 1, 2003:22 involved one vehicle17 involved male teen drivers15 involved non-use of seat belts by teens14 involved teen drivers with passengers10 involved alcohol use by teens 9 involved speeding by teens

a.m. p.m.

By Adrienne Lewis, USA TODAY

Most of the fatal crashes involving teens took place after dark — before 7 a.m. and after 8 p.m.Nov. 1, 2003: Fatalities and time of day

12 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Nguyen swerves right after missing exitfor Interstate 25; car slides clockwise.

Car slides throughsmall post

Source: Colorado State Patrol

1

2

3

4

5 Driver’s door strikes guardrail. Railpushes the door through the passen-ger compartment, and Nguyen (whois wearing seat belt) is partially eject-ed and dies. Other passengers injured.

Nguyen corrects tothe left; car slidescounterclockwise.

Nguyen corrects to the right;car slides clockwise and goesoff left side of exit ramp.

Asphalt/concrete

Dirt median

Westbound E-470

Ramp to Interstate 25

One fatal accident

Denver

Miles

0 2

Site ofaccident

E-470

N

2588

470

later. She was driving the nextmonth, at night, when she crashed.

"Really, the only way to get theexperience is to go out and drive,"Bell says. "If I had to swerve, Iwould know how to do it. Jessiereally didn't."

Marvin Zuckerman, a psycholo-gist and former professor at theUniversity of Delaware, for yearshas studied another reason,beyond inexperience and immatu-rity, why teens tend to be risky drivers. He calls it "sensationseeking."

In driving terms, it's a desire toderive a thrill from the experience.Zuckerman doesn't think fulllicenses should be awarded untilage 21. His research has found thatthe desire to take risks and actimpulsively peaks around age 19 or20. "It's no coincidence the peakaccident rates are in those age

ranges," Zuckerman says.

James Avello, 18, Hersch's formerboyfriend, who recovered frominjuries he suffered in the crash,says the loss of their friends hashad little effect on the driving of hisclassmates at Chaminade-MadonnaCollege Preparatory School. Avellosold his SUV in favor of a lessrollover-prone Mazda Milleniasedan. But many teens, he says,drive their own, often-sporty, carsto school on major highways.

Gerald Miller, 18, the driver in thecrash, transferred to another highschool after enduring death threatsfrom classmates who blamed himfor the deaths, says his mother,Geralyn. She says her son neededintensive therapy.

On the 8th of every month,Schaefer visits the spot on I-95where her daughter was killed onJuly 8, 2003. It's marked with an

Eeyore, Winnie the Pooh's slow butlovable donkey sidekick. Herdaughter's volleyball coach gaveher that name during a lacklusterperformance, and it stuck.

After the crash, Casey Hersch'smother and stepfather moved outof the family home to try to escapetheir anguish. The family still ownsthe home, now unoccupied.Casey's bedroom, filled withEeyores, remains untouched.Schaefer still runs the girl's volley-ball team concession and goes toschool soccer games. Those areabout the only commitments in lifethat she keeps.

"A mother's life is all about beingdevoted to her child," says Schaefer,who chose laughter as her cell-phone ring tone because she so sel-dom hears it anymore. "One crazynight took everything away."

In small groups, imagine that your state legislature has asked you to decide what criteria students must meet

before receiving a license. For example, should driving be restricted to students who maintain B averages or

above? In short, how can teens demonstrate that they will be mature, capable, responsible drivers? Explain each

of your requirements in writing. As you draft your proposal, keep in mind that driving is a privilege, not a right.

According to the USA TODAY analysis of deadly car crashes involving teen

drivers, what is a common formula for teen deaths on the nation’s road-

ways? Based on new medical research, why are younger drivers nearly

five times more likely to be involved in fatal accidents? What effect have

rules that restrict driving at age 16 had? What conditions are the riskiest

for teen drivers? How could these dangers be reduced? After reviewing

the facts and statistics in the article, would it make sense for states to raise

their legal driving age to 17 or 18? (Answer objectively, not from your

point of view as an adolescent.)

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nissan supports driving safety programs

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