Drivers’ Ed students at Patrick County High School (PCHS) learned the dangers of being distracted while driving during a simulation in May.
During the simulation, Virginia State Trooper Ryan Lawson said a state trooper and fellow students distracted the drivers navigating a cone obstacle course.
“There’s two” students “in the back and a trooper in the front,” Lawson said, and explained “the whole purpose is to put them (drivers) through a couple of” scenarios and try to distract each “as best we can, just to get their attention off of what’s going on in the vehicle so that we can show them the dangers of distracted driving.”
Lawson, who is also the Peters Creek District representative on the Patrick County School Board, said the radio will be turned up loud, the students in the back will harass the driver, and the trooper will talk with the driver during the course.
Drivers are also challenged to take a selfie with all the passengers while braking at a stop sign.
“We tell them the cones could be people, animals, objects. If you run over a cone, who knows what you’re running over out there on the highway,” he said.
Lawson said the department holds the simulation every semester for driver’s education students. He estimates about 80 students participated in this semester’s program.
The program is a partnership between the police department, State Farm, and Youth of Virginia Speak Out (YOVASO), an organization seeking to educate and empower youth to influence a safe driving culture.
Lawson said the program originally started as a Driving Under the Influence (DUI) simulator.
“But now, distracted driving has gotten to be more dangerous. In all honesty, now the crashes we’re working” are “more distracted driving as the causing factor than DUI right now. It’s the most dangerous thing you can do on the highway,” he said.
After the simulation was complete, Lawson told the students the simulator was a controlled environment in essentially a glorified golf cart.
“Multiply the weight by four and the speed by 10, and that’s a car. You saw how quickly things could get out of hand with just little cones, your buddies, and us messing with you” in a controlled environment, he said.
Lawson said anything can happen if drivers take their eyes off the road for a split second, especially if they are “going down the road 60 to 70 miles an hour, radio wide open.
“All we’re trying to do is just get you thinking about it while you’re driving,” Lawson said. “This is, again, a controlled environment, but I hope it makes you think about what happens on the roadway when you’re out there.”
