posted on April 7, 2001 08:29:55 PM new
I hate wearing my seatbelt. I also find it offensive that I will get a ticket if I dont wear one. Its my choice to kill myself being throw, or burn up because the buckle wont come off in a wreck. So, I get a fine if I dont wear one,but children can bounce around or get killed not having one in a bus and its ok? Even children in YOUR CAR must be buckled up, or another fine. But not in a bus. Is there something wrong with this picture?
posted on April 7, 2001 10:33:56 PM new
School buses can be outfitted with lap restraints, if a school district asks for them to be from the bus manufacturer, or pays another contractor to retrofit the vehicle after its purchase.
Most school districts don't pay for this safety feature because of the improvements all bus manufacturers were required to make back in the late 70s, early 80s to improve bus construction. For example, buses in the early 70s had seats with exposed metal frame tops. They now have seats with higher, fully padded seat backs, to better protect head injuries in the case of collisions.
The collision impact design of yellow school buses was also improved per NTSB specs. Plus, lap restraints have not proved to be any more effective in bus collisions. Their impact design generally is considered the best safe guard in the case of an accident. There is a website devoted to school bus safety.
I only know any of this because I wrote a story last fall on school bus safety and bus inspections. I spent two months riding big yellow school buses loaded with children. Yeah, that was real fun.
[ edited by Baduizm on Apr 7, 2001 10:37 PM ]
[ edited by Baduizm on Apr 7, 2001 10:37 PM ]
posted on April 7, 2001 10:41:00 PM new
I don't know why there are'nt seatbelts for school buses. Most school districts don't have them, there must be some logic for it.
About wearing your seat belt in a car. I have a kidney transplant. I once asked my doctor what I could do to protect my transplant. (The transplant is placed in the pelvic area). He asked me if I wear my seatbelt. I told him no, and asked him if the belt would injure my transplant if I were in a car crash. He said to me, "if you are in a crash without a seltbelt, your kidney transplant will be the last thing you'll be worrying about". After that conversation, I've always wore it, even before it was the law.
I worked as a city bus driver for 20 years. In that time, I saw many people who were in car accidents and were parailized, in wheelchairs, and injured from the waist down, and the neck down. In some cases, it took several years of physical therapy and retraining to even remotely bring these people back to a minimumal level of function using their arms.
Think of this. Would you want a person to hit you in the head with a brick at 70mph? Probally not. Then why would you put yourself in a position to have your head crash into a steering wheel or dash board at 70 mph?
BTW, when you are in a crash, there are 2 points of impact. The first, when your head hits the steering wheel, and the second, when your brain is slammed against the inside wall of your skull at 70 mph. This often results in a closed head injury. The same goes for your internal organs that are smashed against your rib cage instantly after your body hits the steering wheel.
If you wish to spend the rest of your life in a nursing home drooling, with your tongue hanging from your mouth, then go for it. Also, lets not forget the adult diapers, spoon feeding, inabliity to speak, and the many, many other things that happen in these situations. I value my health.
I think the ideas behind the mandatory seatbeat laws are the following. The carmakers have spent millions in research showing seatbelts save lives and reduce injuries. Insurance companies have worked hard to promote them and have lobbied lawmakers to write regulations requiring their use. The motive behind the insurance company, the less injuried, the less payout of claims. The government wants you to wear a seatbelt in the fact that when you are in a crash and are turned into an instant quadrapelgic, you are unemployable and unisurable. Havong a long term disability, you then become a burden for taxpayers. You are sent to prison for life. What prison you ask? YOUR OWN BODY.
[ edited by yeager on Apr 7, 2001 10:42 PM ]
[ edited by yeager on Apr 7, 2001 10:46 PM ]
posted on April 7, 2001 10:46:51 PM new
Point taken. But I dont want to wear my seat belt and its MY body, MY life, so I choose to refuse to wear it. Same as with helmets. I am an adult. I know I could be killed, but its MY choice, not the governments. If it was a danger to someone else, then I could see it. But its only a danger to myself and its my responsibility to act accordingly to protect ME.
posted on April 7, 2001 10:57:29 PM new
Good point - it is your body. Of course society has to bear the burdon of keeping the silly thing alive after you have allowed the brain to bounce around inside your skull until it is pretty useless.
posted on April 7, 2001 11:07:29 PM new
The car I drive wont bounce me around. It will fold like an accordion. Kaput. All gone. And society can dam well take care of me for the next year or two, if I did live. I paid into it for others all these years. And to people capable of working, too, I might add. But thats another story.
And why is anyone concerned with what I choose to do? So I dont wear my seat belt. So shoot me.
posted on April 7, 2001 11:48:22 PM new
Hi Hepburn, with all due respect, consider the following.
Quiet conversation at the funeral home.
Morner # 1: This is so sad. Joe was going down the street, minding his own business, and a drunk driver hit his car on the passenger side as he was driving through the intersection.
Morner # 2: I know. The police report indicates that if he had a seatbelt on, he would not have been thrown to the passenger side of the front seat and would have been able to retain control of the car if he were able to remain seated behind the wheel.
Morner # 1: That's what I understand also. Shortly after he was hit, his car crossed over the yellow line and he hit another car head on causing a second accident. This second accident killed a mother and her 1 year old.
Morner # 2: I understand that the family of the mother are suing Joe's estate for his negligence in the accident. Their attorney claims that if he had a seatbelt on, he could have remaimed in control of the car.
Morner # 1: That's too bad, he worked hard to accomplish what he had.
Morner # 2: Your're right, he was a hard worker. They bury him tomorrow. But now his wife has to contend with a lawsuit after loosing her spouse. It's so sad.
posted on April 7, 2001 11:48:55 PM newHepburn:, I have been in two serious accidents. Fortunately, I was not severely injured in either one of them. In both instances, if I had not been wearing my seat belt, I'd be DEAD and I know it.
As far as yourself is concerned, consider that your accident will escalate the damage to yourself. Where you could easily walk away from an accident, you now have to be flown to a hospital. The police officers, firemen, emergency personnel on the accident scene, the helicopter and pilot, the trauma doctors and nurses -- and you may end up with a $100,000 bill.
Now, if you survive, look at all of time and costs involved that you caused. It's not just you, it's a whole lot of people! And if you have to go bankrupt because of your bills, then everyone else is affected with higher costs for services! You are not living by yourself on a mountainside in the remote Rocky Mountains and never seeing anyone at all, you live in a society. And by living in this society what you do or fail to do affects others no matter how badly you want to imagine that it won't.
posted on April 8, 2001 12:12:30 AM new
Back to the original topic:
It's not just the belts, it's the seats.
In the case of a rear end collision in which the head is thrown back, seat belts could concievably worsen the situation. Many years ago I was rearended. It was barely a fenderbender. It happened at maybe 10 mph and you had to look real hard to see my any difference in my bumper (it was a city bus that rearended me!) but I had a stiff neck for days. Unlike my car and other passenger vehicles in which the seats backs are higher and provide support, if a school bus was rearended with older students buckled in, the current seat backs would give no support at all to the neck or head, and the majority would most likely have some degree of whiplash or neck injury. I am not saying that flying bodies are safer or better, just that the idea of adding seatbelts to current busses is not the easy answer it appears.
posted on April 8, 2001 01:57:09 AM newHepburn, Seems nuts to me that as parents and community we'll spend whatever it takes to educate our children in the hope that they'll be well prepared for adult life, and yet we won't spend the comparitively small amount needed to ensure that we give them a better chance of living to become adults.
The wearing of seat belts should be compulsory, not only for kids on a school bus, but for any driver or passenger in any kind of vehicle.
I know that you have told us that you chose not to and your reasons why. I wonder if you'll tell us you're glad you didn't wear a seatbelt one day when you're broken and busted up after a motor wreck you could have easily walked away from.
posted on April 8, 2001 02:36:07 AM new
In my opinion it is our duty to wear a seatbelt. I have lost 4 members of my family due to road accidents. My sister died in an accident many years ago, she died instantly with no visible signs of injury, she was sitting in the back straight behind a high backed seat. The driver and front passenger also died, but they lingered on for a few days. They were almost unrecognisable to there parents. One girl was thrown through the windscreen and the other was thrown up against the steering wheel. Both died painful deaths. Maybe a seatbelt would not have saved their lives but we will never know, because they did not have seatbelts on to start with.
All of these children, and I will call them children, because they had just finished (on the day of the accident) there end of year 12 formal education, and they thought they were going to have time to work, fall in love, have children ect. A lot of families suffered on that fateful night, and maybe if seatbelts had of been compulsery back then they may be alive today.
My grandmother was also in a car crash, she was wearing a seatbelt, and it did save her life as far as injuries go, but her heart could not cope with the stress, if she had not been at an advanced age I am sure she would have survived the accident. 2 of my cousins also died in a car crash, neither of them had seatbelts on, both died.
I will not start my car unless everyone in it has a seatbelt on and done up. No seatbelt on, you can walk.
School buses most certainly need seatbelts in them and then we need to educate the children to wear them, and it needs to be monitored constantly.
posted on April 8, 2001 07:45:45 AM new
I appreciate the lectures behind your advice and reasons as to why one should wear a seat belt. Thank you. Noted. However, its my decision to wear one or not wear one (yes, I am fully aware of the consequences).
I brought this topic up because I didnt understand why every car owner MUST have a child safely buckled in while in OUR vehicles, but when in a school bus, it isnt the law, nor are the buses outfitted with any.
posted on April 8, 2001 08:51:43 AM new
I have a friend who drives school bus in anotherr state and the stories he tells are horrible.
He has to deal with kids that come on the bus without a coat in snowy cold weather shivering with wet feet in cheap tennis shoes. He has to deal with kids that urinate in the bus and expose themselves to the other kids. He has been assaulted by parents when he stopped to pick up kids. There is no order or discipline at all. I have to say if they put seat belts in it would be nice for the kids that would use them but if they made the driver responsible for seeing that they were used the bus would never make the route in any timely fashion. The only way I see for compliance would be with an electronic interlock so the bus could not be put in gear and moved until the belts were fastened. Ands for safety unhooking them after you were moving could not stop the bus.
posted on April 8, 2001 08:56:16 AM new
Morning everyone ^^^^ Great subject, Hepburn.
I went to the NHTSA (National Hwy. Transportation Safety Administration site and here's the answer they give on the subject"
(begin quote) "The NHTSA Position
The National Highway Transportation Administration (NHTSA) has issued a position statement on seat belts on school buses, concluding that "there is insufficient reason for a Federal mandate for seat belts on large school buses."
The statement points out that:
"School bus transportation is one of the safest forms of transportation in the United States. We require all new school buses to meet safety requirements over and above those applying to all other passenger vehicles. These include requirements for improved emergency exits, roof structure, seating and fuel systems, and bus body joint integrity. These requirements help ensure that school buses are extremely safe."
NHTSA feels that the best way to provide crash protection to passengers is through "compartmentalization,"in which "buses provide occupant protection so that children are protected without the need to buckle-up. Occupant crash protection is provided by a protective envelope consisting of strong, closely-spaced seats that have energy-absorbing seat backs."(end quote)
When the seat belt law started requiring they be worn, I complied. But I feel the same way hepburn does....should be my choice.
posted on April 8, 2001 09:34:47 AM new
Hello Lindak
Thats a great response from them (the quote you posted), but I, also, am a safe driver, so that quote could be used by me to the next police officer that pulls me over for not wearing one. I dont take my drivers license anymore. DMV mails it to me. Perfect record, I have (except for the seat belt thing which doesnt affect my driving record).
Gravid, excellent idea. Bus cannot move without all belts having a sensor showing they are fastened.
posted on April 8, 2001 09:50:17 AM new
That quote from the NHTSA is kind of missing the point, IMO. Sure, the buses may be structurally safe and built to a high standard...but, that doesn't do much for the kids bouncing around inside, in an accident.
I thought long and hard about wearing a seatbelt in my car. You're really playing the odds. People are sometimes saved by being thrown out of the car...
My Dad was a fatalist, so he refused to wear one. His choice. I'm not, so I wear one. My choice. IOW, Hepburn, I agree with you... Personal choice is one of my favorite things.
posted on April 8, 2001 01:06:38 PM new
here in Florida they just repealed the motorcycle helmet law. if someone wants to risk their own life that's their business. although i consider the seatbelt law somewhat of an intrusion, the fact is that there are a large number of accidents caused by an initial impact dislodging an unbelted driver from his/her position, causing them to lose control of a vehicle that they would have otherwise been able to remain in control of had they been belted in. this loss of control often leads to an additional impact(s) which can cause additional injuries/deaths to the driver, passengers or the occupants of another vehicle. this IMHO is the single most significant justification for the mandatory seatbelt use laws. they should be used on all buses. p.s.-banning the use of cell phones may seem like another invasion of privacy but the statistics are now showing that their use is now causing about as many accidents as alcohol.
[ edited by stusi on Apr 8, 2001 01:07 PM ]
posted on April 8, 2001 03:36:27 PM new
Here are some of the reasons why NHTSA had decided they weren't necessary. Many states do require seat belts in school buses, but from reading some of the many pages on this site, it looks like even the ones they've 'retrofitted' are just as unsafe as the buses without belts.
(begin quote)"By all measures, school buses are the safest motor vehicles on the highways.
When comparing the number of fatalities of children ages 5 through 18 during "normal school transportation hours," in the 1988 through 1998 school years, school buses are 70 times safer than passenger cars, light trucks, and vans.1
From 1988 to 1998, an average of 10 passengers were killed each year in school bus crashes. Most of the school bus fatalities were in non-survivable situations (the fatality occurred at the point of maximum damage to the school bus)"end quote.
Other pages on their site speak to the issue that more children are injured walking to school.
And then there's also the issue of children who take/ride public transporation to get to school....without seat belts.
Personal choice is one of my favorite things.