Don't Drink and Fly (or Drive) on Halloween!

Yesterday I posted about the things you need to take with you when you're trick-or-treating with your kids.  One of the most important items is a flashlight, because when it's dark and you have kids running around looking for candy, the last thing they're thinking about is road safety.  We need flashlights to make sure drivers see us.... but we also need drivers to realize that they need to take even more care than usual.  They have to remember that there will be little kids in dark robes crossing the street, darting in and out between parked cars in their excitement.  The last thing they need is a driver who shouldn't be out on the road... in other words a driver that has been drinking.

Two days before Halloween Night, I thought it would be a good idea to scare everyone with these Halloween statistics from the NHSTA:

• Kids have a greater chance of being fatally injured by a car on Halloween than any other day of the year, including the Fourth of July and New Year’s Day.
• Halloween Was Deadliest Day of the Year for Child Pedestrian Accidents:
• One hundred and fifteen child pedestrian fatalities occurred on Halloween over the 21 years of our analysis. That is an average of 5.5 fatalities each year on October 31, which is more than double the average number of 2.6 fatalities for other days.
• Drivers Who Posed the Greatest Risk: Young drivers ages 15-25 accounted for nearly one-third of all fatal accidents involving child pedestrians on Halloween.

That's more terrifying than any haunted house!  So on October 31 (and on any day of the year!), please don’t drink and drive:

• Designate a driver
• Stay overnight at the party venue
• Stay home and have fun handing out candy to the goblins and ghost who knock on your door.

Let's all have a safe and fun Halloween Night!