Researchers found that a single teenage passenger with a teen driver doubles the risk of a fatal crash, while the risk is five times higher when two or more teens ride along.
The class president and the prom king were heading to the dance, packed into a car with four other kids. The 16-year-old driver was sober and wasn’t speeding. But she got distracted.
And Donna Sabet lost her daughter, Gillian.
Jill, as she was known, and her boyfriend — both passengers — died when the car flipped over that March 2005 night on an Irvine, California road.
"Somebody asked for a pack of gum, and there was a pack of gum in the driver’s seat pocket and she reached for it, and for an instant looked away from the road and lost control of the vehicle," Donna Sabet told CNN.
"I loved being her mom. From the moment she was born to the moment she left … that night. I loved being her mom. And I miss her so much." (Watch Donna Sabet discuss her daughter’s death 
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Every year, teenage drivers are involved in 6,000 to 8,000 car crashes — four times the rate of older drivers.
A recent National Teen Driver Survey attempted to find out why. And to get more honest answers, researchers asked thousands of high school students what their friends do while driving.
The teens described a driving environment that would be challenging even to experienced drivers. And the results suggested that the kind of accident that killed Gillian Sabet and her boyfriend was no accident.
While some 90 percent of teen drivers say they don’t drink and drive, nine out of 10 say they’ve seen passengers distracting the driver, or drivers using cell phones. More than a third say they don’t wear seat belts consistently. (Read the report [pdf]
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"Most kids think that they’re invulnerable," said Ramon Hernandez, one of Jill’s friends.
Actually, they’re inexperienced — and, according to Jill’s brother, easily distracted.
"It could be music, it could be cell phones, it could be friends in the back even," said Jason Sabet.
So teenage drivers should pay closer attention. That’s easy for adults to say. But when those young drivers are out on the road, what do they see? Men making calls. Women putting on makeup, getting ready for work. Everyone eating.
And when you’re 16 and trying to stand up to your friends?
"You never want to be the uncool guy in the group," said another of Jill’s friends, Andres Villalobos. "So you tell someone to buckle up and they’re like, ‘You’re not my dad, don’t tell me what to do.’"
That’s why Jill’s family and friends have started a Web site called Journey Safe, a program to encourage teenage drivers to buckle up and turn down the music and shut off their phones.
"I don’t care if it’s not cool," says Jason Sabet. "I want to keep people safe, and I want to stay alive."
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 7,500 teenage drivers were involved in fatal crashes in 2005. Speeding is more common than substance abuse. And about 70 percent see friends driving fatigued or in a highly emotional state.
The teen driving survey, sponsored by State Farm Insurance Co. and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, asked more than 5,600 high school students not about their own behavior but what they see in peers.
And two-thirds of the teens surveyed said that when it comes to driving, their parents’ opinion still mattered.
"We need to go beyond the message of drinking and driving and also talk about the message of distractions," the study’s chief investigator, Dr. Flaura Winston, told The Associated Press.
Researchers found that a single teenage passenger with a teen driver doubles the risk of a fatal crash, while the risk is five times higher when two or more teens ride along. Most states have laws restricting passengers when teens drive, but 15 states do not, AP reported.
"The environment for a teen driver is much more challenging and demanding than most of us adults thought," Laurette Stiles, vice president of strategic resources at State Farm, told AP.
"They’re trying to manage all of that while trying to navigate the vehicle at the same time and they’re pretty inexperienced at that." More here.
Via CNN