Anyone who drives on a regular basis knows that sooner or later you have to drive at night. For some people, driving at night is a necessary and regular occurrence. For people who work at night or go to school at night, nighttime driving is unavoidable. For the rest of us, we generally find ourselves driving at night at least once or twice a week. Some people will tell you that they don’t like to drive at night. Others claim that they prefer to drive at night. Regardless of whether you are one of those that prefers to drive at night or one of those that would just as soon not, the reality is that nighttime driving is considerably more dangerous than daytime driving. What is it that makes the dark such a dangerous backdrop for driving?
There are a number of factors that make nighttime driving more dangerous than daytime driving – despite that fact that there are substantially fewer vehicles on the road at night. At night, even under the best of circumstances, we are missing many of the visual cues that we use during the day for driving. We can’t see the signs as well – especially on rural roads that are not well lit. This makes it easier to miss a warning sign for an upcoming curve or even a stop sign at an intersection. The line markings on the side of the road are harder to make out. Even oncoming vehicles are harder to see at night. We are accustomed to looking for these cues – subconsciously – to tell us where we are and where we need to be. The darkness leaves us without much of the framework that we use during the day to drive safely.
Another issue that is frequently found to be the cause of accidents at night is fatigue. If you are accustomed to sleeping at night, then your body will become sleepy at some point while driving at night. Even if you take a nap during the day to prepare for your nighttime driving, your internal clock is still set to get sleepy at night. If you are one of the millions of people that work the graveyard shift, then maybe you are used to being awake at night, but the majority of the people out on the roads with you aren’t. So even if you aren’t getting sleepy, chances are that the guy driving next to you or the lady coming at you down the road may be falling asleep at the wheel. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the fatal crash rate for accidents that happen at night is three to four times higher than accidents that happen during the day.
Lastly, more drunk driving accidents happen at night. Statistics also tell us that nighttime drivers were almost four times more likely to be killed in a drunk driving accident than were daytime drivers. Again, your own driving behavior may be impeccable but you must also take into consideration the other drivers out on the road with you and the chances are higher at night that they have had too much to drink.
If you have been involved in an auto accident and would like an experienced California auto accident attorney to evaluate your case, contact Emery Ledger of Ledger & Associates on his website at www.ledgerlaw.com or at his toll-free number – 1-800-300-0001.
