Cell Phones & Driving "Just The Facts!"
"If your company truly wants to do your customers a service, you will vehemently discourage any use of their phones while operating a vehicle unless in a dire emergency." - Mrs. Amy Seager
In Memory of Kathy Seager & Kimberly Seager (Dec 27, 1984 - July 29, 2002)
Twin sisters killed in a crash caused by a driver on a cell phone You are twice as likely to miss a traffic signal |
- Your reaction time is slower to the signals you do detect
- Your risk of causing a crash increases by 400%!
- This amount of risk is the same as if you were driving legally intoxicated! Your chances of causing a crash are 4x greater!
The Harvard University's Center for Risk Analysis estimates that cell phones are the cause of 2600 deaths, and 570,000 injuries each year. Cell phones are also to blame for 1.5 million crashes per year resulting in property damage.
- Using Hands Free equipment does not improve driver performance. It is the phone conversation that distracts!
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--- Original Message -----
From: "Amy M Seager"
To: "Contact Form"
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 7:06 PM
Subject: Your safety tips to drivers if they will be using a cell phone.....
Both of my twin daughters were killed by a driver on a phone. Their names were Kimberly and Kathy Seager. This was not a "split second" of inattention. The man had a clear view of the car our children were in for a quarter of a mile as well as the flashing train signal lights, the lowered gate, and the very loud train whistle. Yet he plowed into them at 60mph, never hitting the brakes. Phone conversations cause "tunnel vision" and "inattention blindness" in drivers according to the findings of Dr. David Strayer of the University of Utah. Many respected researchers across the country and in other parts of the world concur that headsets do not improve driving performance in drivers engaged in a phone conversation. Because it is not holding the phone that is the greatest danger, it is the phone conversation. Hence the tendency of drivers on phones to run red lights, stop signs, and train signals.
Therefore, offering instructions on how to use the phone safely while operating a motor vehicle is immoral and irreprehensible. You are lulling drivers into a false sense of security that if they follow these "tips", they will be safer.
If your company truly wants to do your customers a service, you will vehemently discourage any use of their phones while operating a vehicle unless in a dire emergency.
Mrs. Amy Seager
RF Safe's Reply
From: "webmaster"
To: "Amy M Seager"
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 11:55
Subject: Re: Your safety tips to drivers if they will be using a cell phone..
Hi Amy
I lost my girl because of cell phone radiation, and I support you! My site
is to inform people! I only sell accessories to help and to support my research for better solutions. My site is here to give people the facts!
I am very sorry it happen to you! People need the facts!
You are a FACT! and people need to hear your voice too!
http://www.rfsafe.com/state_cell_phone_laws.htm
I linked you on many more pages that deal with driving and cell phones too
GodBless
I hope this helps. if I can do more please let me know.
John Coates
http://www.rfsafe.com/Seager.htm
Also linked to home page
Mrs. Seager's Reply
----- Original Message -----
From: Amy Seager
Sent: Friday, August 22, 2003 2:23
Subject: Re: Your safety tips to drivers if they will be using a cell phone.....
Oh, John, I am so sorry. What was your girl's name? How old was she? Is there a picture on your site?
Because of what happened to my girls, I've read some about the radiation risks, but don't know a lot.
When I was contacting attorneys about starting a class action suit against the CTIA, one of them informed me about the radiation suit and how it had been dismissed even though they had plenty of evidence. He wasn't enthusiastic about going up against the industry again. The CTIA simply enrages me with their careless disregard about human life. They are constantly pushing the headsets for drivers, when they know full well that there is no safety advantage. And they are forever comparing the distraction of a phone with eating a hamburger when they are fully aware of the experts' conclusions on the matter. Meanwhile, every year, thousands are killed.
My husband is on his cell all the time (except while driving, of course) and after what you told me, now I'm worried about him. I will look into getting him a shield.
Thank you for adding the links and my warning to your site. I am working on updating my site and will add a reciprocal link to yours.
Amy
RF Safe's Reply
----- Original Message -----
Dear Amy,
The damage to my Girl was done in the first weeks of pregnancy that resulted in her living only 15 minutes or so after birth. On the birth and death certificates we chose the name Angel Leigh Coates, to depict our true feeling that she is now an Angel among us in heaven.
As far as the CTIA goes, they only flip cards for the hands that feed it! Dedicated to only one thing – “protecting sustained growth for overall profitability of the wireless industry” They have threatened me in the past but my Internet presents was not affected. However pressure from the CTIA has added pressure on the FTC to water down fears over RF Safety.
This is done by not offering any other methods of gauging health effects except those offered by industry-funded programs. CTIA has only supported SAR Levels developed by the IEEE. these standards measure the heat generated by the phones radiation output and does not consider any biological effects whatsoever!
In a decision released August 14, the FCC admitted that there was a "dearth of [scientific] information" concerning the health effects of RF radiation. The FCC noted that only the industry proposals (ANSI/IEEE) were submitted for its consideration. The FCC said that it would open a fact-finding proceeding when "reliable pertinent information [was] developed."
This clearly tells the truth of the matter that an industry was again given the power to regulate itself. In 1996 the Federal Telecommunications Act was passed by the House and Senate and signed into law by President Clinton. It was enacted to regulate and govern the new technologies of the electromagnetic (wireless) telecommunications industry. This act, while necessary to a growing industry and technology, is biased in favor of the telecommunication companies over the public interest in that the current law prohibits local communities (states, cities, townships etc.) from having any jurisdiction over the sitting of cellular base station antennas with regard to health and safety issues. Legal scholars are of the opinion that many facets of The Federal Telecommunications act are in fact unconstitutional under the first and tenth amendments.
The effects of this kind of bombardment and interaction of RF radiation have never been studied as the FCC recognized on August 14 and to preclude local safety and health concerns is preposterous. We feel that caution is required when the technology implemented by industry (supported by government) exceeds our capacity to understand it's long-term social and environmental effects. In the case of electromagnetic radiation it may be decades before we fully realize the consequences of our actions. Unfortunately there have been many instances in our country's history where we have not proceeded with caution with regard to health and public safety concerns. (Tobacco, Asbestos, etc.) I fear unless we take a common sense approach we will be condemned to repeat our past mistakes.
I have always taken the approach that I had to build my own media for people to find the truth about cell phone hazards. The Internet gave me a platform for people to hear my voice side by side with the industry. Without this information consumers cannot make an informed decision. My goal is to build so many WebPages that no matter what people search for they will be exposed to the warnings we both have for all cell phone users when looking for anything about cell phones online. Not only must I continue to build a media to support my educating the public, I must provide the solutions for changing an industry that is way off track with regards to public safety!
My willingness to support you (Driving issues) and any effort to balance the so-called dearth of scientific research goes unmatched. Supporting new private studies and public awareness efforts fits well with my vision for rfsafe I posted in 1998 "To become a self supportive charity for mankind to lessen or leave no impact on the environment and life from the use of new wireless technologies, putting safety first!"
RF Safe has a growing number of websites and retail establishments around the world that support our awareness efforts in RF Safety. This explosive growth in name recognition for total RFS solutions is responsible for our projection of becoming a household name in the cellular safety market place. Educating the public is priority #1 - Real life facts!
Please consider this mutually beneficial awareness endeavor, or please pass it alone to anyone you may run into that wishes to join my battle to inform the public of the real hazards of owning a cell phone and how to use it safely!
Please help me make your points on driving issues, everyone looking up cell phone laws online finds my site - now let them find the truth!
Thank you
John Coates
References
Does Cell Phone Conversation Impair Driving Performance? Dr. David Strayer, Frank Drews, Robert Albert and William Johnston, University of Utah
Association Between Cellular Telephone Calls and Motor Vehicle Collisions, The New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 336, 1997, Donald A. Redelmeier, MD, and Robert J. Tibshirani, PH.D.
