This is an informative article about driving drowsy. In the article we see many negative effects of driving sleepily and some situations which might help you avoid falling asleep when driving.

How to Stay Awake While Driving

Jack R. Landry is a certified technician and has been repairing broken and cracked windshields since the 80s. He recommends (http://www.DiamondGlass.com) for windshield repair in Utah.

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Falling asleep at the wheel is very dangerous. It is important to be aware of the signs of drowsy driving and try your hardest to prevent dosing off while driving.

When you are tired your reaction time is impaired, you are less likely to be aware of your surroundings and your judgment cannot always be trusted. There have also been studies that have shown that as a driver becomes tired he or she will become more aggressive.

Driving when you are drowsy can have the same results as driving when you are drunk or on drugs. You are much more likely to get into a car accident and you risk injuring not only yourself but also someone else.

In our nation every year there are about 71,000 injuries that can be correlated with falling asleep at the wheel and at least 1,500 deaths a year. It is also suspected that there are many more sleep related crashes every year that are not reported.

Many people believe that the majority of these problems have to be a result of the long haul truck drivers, but this conception is false. The truck drivers that fall asleep at the wheel make up less than 1 percent of all of the sleep-related accidents.

There is a federal law that only allows truck drivers to drive 10 hours in a 24 hours period. Although there may be some that break this law, the majority of drivers adhere to this law and know how important it is that they do not fall asleep as they drive.

There are many states that are cracking down on drowsy drivers. In New Jersey a law was passed that enables a drowsy driver to be tried for vehicular homicide.

This law was named after a 20-year-old college student that was hit and killed by a drowsy driver, and is called “Maggie’s Law”. Although not all states have such a strict policy concerning drowsy drivers, many states will give those drivers jail time.

There have been many studies done on driving drowsy. Researchers have chosen to define drowsy driving as the period of time when a driver closes his or her eyes for more than a blink, the drivers that were rigid and not responding to oncoming or surrounding traffic and the drivers who’s heads fell forward and then jolted upright again.

Many of these studies have shown that the majority of accidents will occur during the day. The sleep related accidents that occur at night are usually more serious in nature because they are more likely to happen on back roads or freeways when the driver is alone.

All of the age groups that were studied had the same rate of falling asleep at the wheel except for one. The one outlying group was the 18-20 year old group.

They believe that this age was more likely to fall asleep because of the irregular sleeping habits of this age group and the lack of experience they have while driving. This age group was as much as 5 times more likely to fall asleep at the wheel than any other age group.

The work schedules of drivers have a very high correlation with the accidents that occur from drowsy driving. If someone is working the night shift they are more than 6 times as likely as anyone else to get into an accident as a result of drowsy driving.

A long commute and having more than one job were also correlated with the number of accidents that occurred. If your life falls into any of these categories it is important to be extra cautious of falling asleep at the wheel.

There are some simple steps that can be taken to avoid any accidents caused by drowsy driving. If you are feeling sleepy, pull over and drink a caffeinated beverage.

On average it will take about 30 minutes for the caffeine to set in, so after taking a drink you may want to take a nap. It is very important to get at least 6 hrs of sleep the night before a road trip.

The visibility from the inside of your car is also important. You want to make sure that your windshield is not cracked or dirty as you drive long distances.

Making sure that you take all of the necessary precautions to avoid drowsy driving as you can is imperative for your safety. Driving drowsy is just too risky for not only you, but for those around you as well.

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