We all know that fiddling with your mobile phone while behind the wheel of a vehicle is a boneheaded move. Texting, updating your social media and snapping selfies while driving has become a dangerous and deadly phenomenon. Now, a popular app has, inadvertently, we’re guessing, kicked up the risk factor.
The culprit is Snapchat’s new speed filter, which records and posts how fast a phone is moving and awards virtual trophies for the highest speeds among friends and followers. So, if you’re in your car, headed down the highway at triple-digit speeds, all your friends know it. And the thrill of competition, however ridiculous, is just too tempting for some to resist, creating a devastating mix of speed and social media.
Case in point: 18-year-old Christal McGee, who allegedly was using Snapchat’s speed filter while going 107-mph on an Atlanta highway when she slammed into a car driven by Wentworth Maynard. This happened on a stretch of roadway where the speed limit is 55 mph and, according to a passenger who was in the car with McGee and apparently rattled enough to fess up, she had hit 113 mph shortly before the accident.
Now, Maynard is left with a traumatic brain injury, unable to work and gets around only with a wheelchair or walker. He’s suing and we’re guessing he’ll win in court. After all, McGee even made the not-so-bright decision to post a photo of her bloodied face on Snapchat while in the ambulance.
We here at E3 Spark Plugs urge you to turn your mobile phones off and pay attention to the roadways when driving. Distracted driving kills more than 3,000 people and injures some 425,000 in the US each year, and mobile phones are among the top causes. Seriously – your social media post can wait and that Snapchat virtual trophy simply isn’t worth a life drastically altered or even ended. Sign off and stay safe.
