I've long been disturbed by how so many people-- truckers included-- still do not wear seatbelts when in a vehicle. Maybe I am a hopeless Safety Sam but I even tell my kids to stay buckled up when we pull into a gas station or wherever on the off chance that someone may plow into our car while we are assumably safely parked.
Why might I think so? Well, one of many reasons leaps right to mind. Back in my college days, several of my friends and I spent a pleasant if Scotch-soaked evening in our hometown's Safari Pub (I think every burg worth its salt had such an establishment in the '70s but I digress). Things got interesting after last call when we all left and headed for our separate cars.
It was raining cats and dogs and foggy to boot and partly due to that and partly due to the ample time he'd just spent with Johnnie Walker, my friend Jim (just like in A.A., no surnames here!) fairly promptly drove the front of his late-model Pinto into a rather high parking-lot curb. His speed was low enough for the little car to look hardly damaged.
But he was not wearing his seat belt and upon impact, his body travelled forward unimpeded and-- not being the tallest guy around-- his mouth slammed into the steering wheel. That led to a trip to the emergency room where a plastic surgeon was called in (wisely) to sew up the insides of his cheeks, which were cut to ribbons by the orthodontic braces on his teeth.
Lesson learned: Could it be any easier? Just wear the seatbelt and save yourself all sorts of pain and suffering if not worse. As for me, the only place you'll catch me in a vehicle without being buckled up is in my own driveway.
No wonder I am thrilled to report that Lifeguard Technologies-- by far the biggest supplier of seatbelts to trucking-- has launched its "Click, Tug and Snug" (CTS) safety campaign to help drive up the use of seatbelts by truck drivers.
If you click below, you can see a sample clip of the nine-minute CTS training video right from here:
If you click here, you will go directly to Lifeguard's CTS site where you can view four clips from the video to get a fuller sense of its content.
You can order free copies of the video for training purposes from Lifeguard at the CTS site by clicking on the "Contact" tab.
According to Lifeguard, the video is intended to be generic but does include instructions on how to use their Komfort Latch and Sliding Komfort Latch to make wearing seatbelts more comfortable. The company also urges fleets to equip cabs with high-visibility (typically orange) seatbelts to encourage consistent use as they make it is easy to see who's buckled up at a glance.
And if you-- or your drivers-- still need convincing as to why everyone should wear seatbelts in every vehicle, take a look at what someone who really should have known better has to say on this topic:
