Ah, summer: the season of warm weather, vacations and school breaks — and therefore busier roads.
AAA has dubbed the period between Memorial Day and Labor Day — when teen drivers are out of school — as the “100 Deadliest Days.” During this stretch of summer, the average number of fatal teen driver accidents is 15 percent higher than it is the rest of the year.
(Hint: If you’ve got a new teen driver, check out “10 Ways to Save When Your Teen Starts Driving.”)
If you’re out on the road, some days of the week are more dangerous than others, according to new statistics from the auto insurance data website EverQuote.
The statistics come from EverQuote’s safe-driving app, EverDrive. The app passively monitors users’ driving habits to give them feedback they can review later with the aim of improving their driving skills.
The data from the app show there are three days of the week to be wary of:
- Thursday and Friday are the days on which distracted driving is most frequent.
- Friday is the day on which risky acceleration, such as hard acceleration, is most frequent.
- Sunday is the day on which speeding is most frequent.
There’s also a time of day to be wary of — rush hour. Specifically, between 4 and 6 p.m., the largest number of EverDrive users (69 percent) were found to speed. During the same time span, the largest number of users (68 percent) were also found to be using their phones — which could involve answering a call, texting or checking social media.
Other discomforting statistics include that the average drive lasts 21 minutes and people who use their phone while driving spend about 7 percent of that drive time on their phones, on average. That amounts to about 88 seconds of phone use per drive — enough time to drive the equivalent of 17 football fields, assuming a speed of 55 mph.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Expedia found last year that texting is the behind-the-wheel behavior that sparks the most road rage among Americans.
How do you feel about phone use behind the wheel? Sound off below or over on our Facebook page.
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