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Distraction is hell on wheels
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The Metrolink crash in LA. Maybe texting wasn't such a great idea.
Most of us text or make cell phone calls these days as easily as brushing our teeth. But we are also rapidly finding out that there are places where mobile devices can kill.
Last month, President Obama signed an executive order that forbids federal employees from texting or using cell phones in cars to conduct government business. A ban on text messaging for bus drivers and truckers who cross state lines is just around the corner.
There is certainly enough evidence these days that the presence of mobile devices in moving vehicles or aircraft is a dangerous convenience. In Los Angeles, a texting light rail engineer plowed through red signal lights in 2008, killing 25 people in a horrific accident. Even more recently, the pilots of a Northwest Airlines jet en route to Minneapolis, over shot their destination when they claimed they were so engrossed in what was on their laptops, they lost track of the route of flight.
Let’s see: these guys are piloting a steel tube weighing 154,000 pounds, moving at a speed of 500 mph, 37,000 feet in the air, with 144 passengers and they are calling up files on their laptops? Are we all losing our minds?
In California, it is now state law that all drivers must have “handsfree” technology when using cell phones in cars. This also now includes a ban on texting while driving. Yet, the number of motorists who can be seen with a phone glued to their ear or covertly glancing downward as they weave about the freeway seems to exceed those who don’t. Either way, one has to wonder about the wisdom of allowing these devices inside moving vehicles at all.
There are more accidents waiting to happen. Perhaps this is one place and time where mobile tech cannot and should not be used.
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