Defensive Driving Saves Lives and Prevents Personal Injury.
Accidents happen for all kinds of reasons. Bad weather, distracted drivers, stray animals running in front of cars, poor judgment by other drives on the road, car problems, and on and on. Reckless driving, however, is a special case and category. If a driver on the road intentionally drives unsafely, wantonly ignoring reasonable standards of conduct that either ignores that increased probability that it will cause an accident, or acknowledges such a possibility but pushes on anyway, then that is a textbook definition of a reckless driver. If, like me, you live in Los Angeles, you have almost certainly run into a reckless driver or two, probably once a day.
Avoiding a reckless driver involves being a defensive driver. A defensive driver is always alert, always aware, always looking for any potential traffic and driving situations which could cause one to brake suddenly, swerve, or attempt maneuvers which could lead to a potential accident. Being a defensive driver means being an anticipator. The only way to be a good anticipator of potential hazards on the road is to be familiar with the normal standards of conduct on the road, and to know what to do when those standards are challenged by other drivers.
If you see a reckless driver on the road, here are some tips to help you avoid getting hurt, and also save lives.
- first, without posing any risk of danger to yourself, and changing your speed or trajectory, see if you are able to read the license plate. If so, memorize it. If not, take a mental note of the car’s color and make.
- Second, pull over to a safe area. If you are on a highway or freeway, exit first. Once you have exited, and parked your car, find your nearest phone and call the police. Tell the police as much information about the car as possible, what street or freeway it was on, and which direction it was headed. The police will then send a local nearby car to find the reckless driver and pull that car over.
- Third- if for some reason you are unable to avoid getting away from the reckless driver, try to keep as safe a distance as possible. Do not use your phone to call anyone unless you have a hand’s free headset. If you do, call the police immediately and tell them as much detail as you can about the car’s info and the direction it is heading. While you do that, make sure to drive as safely as possible, keeping yourself aware of not only the reckless car, but the other cars around it, and how they are reacting to it. It is a dangerous situation which is why you must keep yourself abreast of everything that is happening in front of you, to the side of you, and behind you.
Sometimes, even with the best defensive driving, we cannot help but get into an accident. In such instances, be sure to contact a Los Angeles personal injury lawyer, or a Los Angeles auto accident attorney who has dealt with issues of reckless driving before.
