When you see another car weaving back and forth in its lane, your first thought is probably that the driver is texting while driving and not that the driver is drunk. Sadly, texting while driving still continues to be a problem in Florida, and the lack of laws regarding texting and driving in this state isn’t discouraging drivers from putting down their phones at the wheel.
People who text while driving have been known to:
- Veer off the side of the road
- Drift into another lane of traffic
- Cross into oncoming traffic
- Cause serious auto accidents resulting in injuries
- Cause death to innocent motorists and pedestrians
Driving with one hand on a phone and eyes looking back and forth between the phone and the road is distracted driving. It is obviously unsafe and nearly every state in this nation has banned texting while driving. However, Florida continues to look the other way, as distracted driving bill after bill has failed to pass.
Currently, state representative Doug Holder, Sarasota-R, has filed a proposed bill that would make texting while driving legal if a driver was doing nothing wrong. However, the bill would allow police officers to cite a driver for texting if that driver was also committing another traffic offense like reckless driving. However, this bill wouldn’t make texting while driving a primary offense, as it is for 34 other states.
Why Texting While Driving Is So Dangerous
When drivers text, they tend to take their eyes off the road for about five seconds at a time to read or type, according to a study by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute. However, five seconds is a long time when a driver is not looking at the road ahead. Many things can change quickly during that time, such as traffic could come to a halt and thus increase a distracted driver’s chances of being in an auto accident in Sarasota and nationwide.
If a driver is concentrating on texting and fails to notice traffic stopping, the accident can be quite violent in nature due to the lack of braking involved. The same is true for auto accidents that occur because a distracted driver veers into someone else’s lane of traffic because he or she is texting. Crashes that occur when brakes aren’t applied can be catastrophic and result in serious injuries and even death.
If you have been the victim of a Sarasota distracted driving accident, please call a Sarasota accident attorney at Mallard Perez for help seeking justice. You can reach us at 888-409-3805 for a free consultation and a free copy of our book What You Need to Know After a Florida Auto, Truck or Bike Accident.
