Blazers paying the price to drive

On Saturday, April 17, senior Lisa Howe stopped her car at the end of Brunett Avenue, preparing to make a left turn onto University Boulevard. Checking both left and right, she saw no oncoming cars and inched the gray Camry onto the main road. Suddenly, a pick-up truck tore around the bend and slammed into Howe's Camry, hurling the Camry into a 360 spin and sending the mangled car over the median to its final resting place.

"I blacked out. I don't remember anything during the crash," Howe says. "But afterwards, I got out and looked at my crushed hood and started bawling."

Howe, who hit her head against the side of the door upon impact, emerged from the accident without serious injury. But that day, she joined the thousands of teens making up 14 percent of fatal car crashes and 20 percent of all police-reported crashes, according to the Dying2Drive Media Campaign. With the alarming number of local teen accidents in the past year and an expected 23 percent increase of teen drivers on the road within the next five years thanks to a population increase, according to the Drive Home Safe web site, the dangers and the consequences for teen drivers will only get worse.

The one at fault

After picking up a friend for school on a rainy and dark morning, senior David Sileshi was preparing to make a left turn when a Honda Civic without its headlights on crashed into Sileshi's car, causing him to slam into another car. "I looked, and I didn't see [the Civic]. I even rechecked, but when [the car] came closer, I could finally see it. But it was too late," he says.

Though the Civic did not have its lights on, Sileshi's insurance company claimed he was at fault because "no matter how dark it was or how slick it was," the Civic had had the right of way, says Sileshi. His insurance company ended up paying $200 for the Civic's damages.

Like Sileshi, Howe was held responsible for her accident. "He had the right of way since he was on the main road, and I was coming from a side street," Howe says. "There was no way to tell that he was speeding."

Senior Julia Sloan has been involved in four accidents, two of which were her fault. Her first major accident occurred in a parking lot last spring when another driver, who was also her friend, accused her of driving too fast. Frustrated, Sloan drove away, cutting diagonally across the parking lot and hitting the driver's side of a woman turning right. Sloan says she is still paying for the $4,000 in damages.

For Howe, Sloan and Sileshi's families, these accidents were expensive. In 2002 alone, the estimated cost of reported crashes for drivers ages 15 to 20 was $40.8 billion, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), teens have the highest crash rates than any other age group. Analyses of fatal crash data indicate that teens are more likely to be at fault in their crashes and more likely to be involved in single-vehicle crashes. Also, teens tend to drive more at night, which accounts for the 40 percent of teen nighttime fatalities.

Russ Rader, Director of Media Relations for IIHS, also says that the reason teens are involved in so many accidents is because they have the "twin demons of lack of experience and immaturity."

"Teens have this false sense of immortality," says Rader, adding that teens are more likely to take risks, speed and not wear their seat belts.

The price of driving

Though the initial fear of breaking the news was nerve-racking, Blazers have found support from their parents. "My parents were nice about it," Sloan says. "They understand that they were just accidents. They were more concerned about my safety." Both Howe and Sileshi's parents bought them new used cars.

However, the insurance companies were not too forgiving. Before his accident, Sileshi paid $400 a year, which included a discount for maintaining good grades. However, after his fender-bender, his insurance company raised his rates to $600 a year. Although she claims her insurance increased slightly after her four accidents, Sloan says her bill was already high because of the '98 BMW sports car she frequently drives. Howe is too afraid to ask how much her parents pay for her auto insurance, but she knows that after her crash, her premium "went up the roof."

Depending on the insurance agency, when a teenager starts driving, typically the family's insurance premium doubles, says Vice President of Insurance Information Institute Caroline Gorman. In 2001, a Maryland household with a teenager typically paid about an average of $783.77 for an auto insurance premium. At that time period, Maryland ranked 14th in the country for the highest insurance premium.

Gorman also warns that if teens are involved in too many accidents and risky behavior such as speeding or drinking and driving, they will be immediately be dropped by their insurance agency and placed in high-risk pools in which they pay about $3,000 to $4,000 a year for high-risk insurance.

Rader claims that driving is a complex skill that teenagers cannot master unless adults strictly enforce rules such as no teenage passengers and no driving at night without parental supervision. "Parents control the car keys," says Rader. "They need to understand the risks of teens getting behind the wheel of a car because driving is the riskiest thing teens will ever do."

Proposed legislation has also been introduced in Maryland in order to restrict teen driving after a recent string of teen driving deaths that occurred last year. Montgomery County Delegate William A. Bronrott proposed limiting the number of passengers for the first six months, banning cell phone usage during the provisional period and increasing the hours of supervised driving from 40 to 60 for minors. Governor Robert Ehrlich also proposed a two-month increase in the learner's permit period, a 90-day suspension for provisional drivers who violate seat belt and curfew laws and a license revocation until the age of 21 for teen drivers who are convicted of driving under the influence.

Rader fully supports Maryland's efforts on restricting teen driving. "The more you cut down on distractions in the vehicle, the more preventable teen accidents will become."

Post-accident nerves

Luckily, Sileshi, Howe, and Sloan walked away from their accident without any serious injuries; however, along with their pricey insurance bills came the emotional trauma.

The first week when Sileshi was back on the road it was a "horrible" experience, he says. "I kept thinking what was I going to get into next," he says. "And I'm trying to keep my new car from getting messed up again." Though the accident is long behind him, Sileshi still takes extra precautions. Before turning, he always checks both ways three times, even if there is no oncoming traffic.

Driving again was not so difficult for Howe, but the memory of her accident was hard to forget. "When my dad took the same left turn awhile later, tears welled up in my eyes," Howe says. "It was a reminder of that day. It was like, 'Why do you want to take this turn when I was just in an accident a couple days ago?'" To this day, she has not taken the turn at the intersection of Brunett and University.

Despite the internal scar that the accident left, Howe says that her ordeal helped her realize that life was more important than materialistic objects. "I learned to let go of the car," she says. "The fact that I survived, my friend survived, the man [in the pick-up truck] survived and I could still walk were more important than my car. My life is more important than the car."