Sunday, May 19, 2013
The National Transportation Safety Board has recommended lowering the legal blood alcohol content limit to 0.05 from 0.08. Tell us: Would you support a lower BAC? Do you think it would curb drunk driving?
Having a few drinks at that summer barbecue? You may soon have to be even more careful before getting behind the wheel. This week, the National Transportation Safety Board voted on a recommendation that would lower the legal limit for drivers' blood alcohol level to 0.05, arguing it would significantly reduce the drunk driving-related deaths reported each year. In Virginia and DC, along with all other states, the legal limit is now 0.08 — the equivalent, for a 180 pound man, of around four 12 oz beers in an hour, according to this blood alcohol content (BAC) calculator. A limit of 0.05 would hold a 180 pound man to fewer than three beers an hour before he gets behind the wheel; a 140 pound woman would be just over the limit after consuming…
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
The Fairfax County Police Department is urging residents to drive safely this holiday season and watch their alcohol consumption.
A total of 607 drivers have been linked to reported crashes after consumption of alcohol in 2012, according to statistics from the Fairfax County Police Department. Of those 607 drivers, 481 were male drivers and 60 drivers were underage at the time of the crash. The statistics were released by the police as part of their Safe December efforts to raise awareness and publicize their goal of alcohol enforcement this holiday season. The release further states that officers arrested 372 drunk drivers during Safe December efforts in 2011, a 17 percent increase compared to 2010. Of those drivers, 85 were female and 287 were male. Seventy-two of those drivers were involved in reported crashes after alcohol consumption. Police arrested a total of …
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Area police chiefs to drunk drivers: We'll get you.
An Alexandria mother remembers a wonderful Christmas Day 2006 with her family. The next day she was beside a hospital bed where her youngest son "was struggling for his life." Greg Berry, 18, a senior at T.C. Williams High School had gone for a ride with a friend who was driving drunk. The car smashed into a telephone pole. Both men extracted from the mangled car by the jaws of life. He had a broken leg, cuts and a severe brain injury that claimed his life April 19, 2007. "Greg died in my arms," his mother Polly said Friday through tears. Behind her, a phalanx of area police chiefs who promised to hunt down and arrest drunk drivers this Christmas season. Prince William Police Officer Jeremy Schenk lost two high school friends, a college …
Barbara Glakas
6:08 am on Tuesday, May 21, 2013
David, A little bit of that is addressed in this NHTSA report. See pages 4-7. It is harder to find drinking and driving statistics for BACs lower than .08 because when they study crashes/fatalities while “impaired” by alcohol, “impairment” is legally defined as .08. http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/811753.pdf more ›