Driving and texting is a bad combination. Save a life maybe yours!
I was driving my new 50th anniversary Ruby Red Mustang with my husband in the passenger seat on a clear sunny day with temperatures of 40 degrees on April 18, 2015. We were waiting patiently at a yield sign for traffic to clear. clear when we feel a strong shake in our seats. The SUV behind us had crashed into the back seat of our new Mustang. My husband immediately called the police. I quickly got out of the Mustang and walked behind my Mustang before the driver backed up and left the accident scene. I looked at the driver, a young woman in her 21s, and noticed that she was texting!
I quickly snapped a photo of the back of my new Mustang that had its license plate embedded in the bumper of my car. His SUV was undamaged, except for the missing license plate stuck to the back of my Mustang, which was previously new and is now damaged. The back looked like a folded accordion. At least no one was hurt.
Police and the fire department were there within 10 minutes of the accident. We showed the cop his license embedded in our Mustang. The cop pulled it out of the back of the Mustang with great force and handed it back to the driver of the SUV, instead of seizing the evidence!
The young woman, a few minutes later, told me how sorry she was to have damaged my new Mustang. She said, “I was on my way to college to take my final exam because I was sick. My final was postponed until today!”
The girl’s mother came forward and did not want her daughter to sign the police report admitting her guilt.
My new damaged Mustang was taken to the dealership and then to the local repair shop.
Meanwhile, the young woman who stopped by my new Mustang with her SUV while texting had her insurance company representative call me. She said: “It was your fault and the police do not count as witnesses. Our insurance company will not pay the claim!”
I told his insurance agent that I had a passenger in my car who witnessed what his client had done to my new 50th Anniversary Mustang and his client’s license was embedded in the back of my car. I had taken a photo to prove it! “
After his call, I called my insurance agent and told him what I had said and asked him to take care of it.
It took me 6 months and over $ 12,000 to repair my 50th Anniversary Mustang to make it look like new! The fire department sent me a bill for $ 200 and the repair shop gave me a bill for $ 200 after the insurance was paid.
My insurance company paid the claim and eventually forced their insurance company to reimburse them for the damages their client had suffered to my Mustang.
Most people are conditioned to respond immediately to other people’s needs, alerts, and messages. Like a drug-addicted lab rat, our brains have been reconfigured to respond.
In the United States, distracted drivers cause 1 in 4 traffic accidentss. That is 1.6 million accidents every year causing 330,000 wounded and dead every year.
Is it worth your life not being able to wait a few minutes to respond to the ping or alert you just received?
One thing I have found helpful is putting my cell phone in the “off” position and placing it out of reach.
If you need your phone for navigation, turn off alerts for all applications other than your map application. They will be there when you reach your destination. More importantly … you will arrive at your destination in one piece!
