There is nothing wrong with going out and having a good time with friends and a few drinks if you are of the legal drinking age. What is not right is getting into any type of vehicle and driving home when you have had more than one or two drinks. Because of the lack of good judgment and experience, teens who are impaired by alcohol often think they are fine, and that is why it is common to hear about teen drunk driving accidents. Those who have been drinking often get upset when someone suggests they should not be driving, and it can be hard to get their keys from them. Sadly, party goers will serve people when they are clearly unfit to drive, and don’t say a word when they walk out the door with car keys in hand.
I write about this important topic because many drunk driving accidents near me have been underage teens. This was a huge problem my son’s high school. Each year, without fail, an accident would claim the lives of some of the children in our school system. There are two problems with this. The first is that someone who is of legal age is buying alcohol for minors. The other problem is that the minors may not know enough about driving while intoxicated, and what drunk driving accidents are all about.
Though some drunk driving accidents are only harmful or fatal to the person driving the car, teens tend to have more than one passenger with them. That means the fatalities can pile up. They may run into friends, and that means they could engage in reckless racing while drunk, which in turn creates even more victims. This is why so many parents worry when their kids go out with friends, and why kids need to know what they are doing when they get their license. Parents should adopt a ‘one strike and you are out’ policy when it comes to doing anything harmful in a car, or when they are caught drinking whether in a car or not.
Though there are some programs in schools that deal with teaching teenagers about drinking and drunk driving accidents, parents have to do more. It is essential that all children learn about these things before they are allowed to get a drivers license. That means talking with them about feeling okay but really being impaired, and also showing them pictures of others their age that have been in teen drunk driving accidents. These can be hard to look at, and are very troubling, but they are the best way to send a strong message about driving when they or their friends have been drinking.
As a parent, you are probably shocked at the high cost of auto insurance for your teen driver. This is due to the higher incidents of auto accidents amongst teenage drivers. But auto insurance prices will vary. You can look for cheap insurance for your car online to easily compare rates. This is worth doing regularly to make sure that you are not paying more than you have to for car insurance.
