Teen driver safety is a major concern for parents and lawmakers as motor vehicle collisions remain a leading cause of death for young adults. Teenagers are also the age group most likely to be involved in a motor vehicle crash because young people do not always have the experience and insight to drive safely on the roads. 
When expressing concern about teen driving, the focus is often on preventing dangerous choices like driving drunk and on teaching defensive driving skills. However, there is also something else that is important to saving lives as well: teaching kids how to maintain their vehicles properly. A personal injury lawyer knows that some young teens are not aware of the importance of vehicle maintenance and do not know how to check for problems with their cars that could lead to an accident on the roads.
Bad Tires Can Lead to Deadly Collisions
One of the biggest risks associated with improper car maintenance is that a problem will develop with one of the tires. According to Health News Digest, as many as 12 percent of the 2.2 million motor vehicle accidents in the United States every single year occur at least in part as a result of a problem with vehicle tires. This is an average of a tire-related accident once every two minutes.
Preventing tire-related accidents is as simple as checking tires regularly and making sure they are maintained properly. Manufacturer guidelines should be followed for replacement and the tires should be properly inflated to the range set by the manufacturer. Tires should also be replaced when the treads have become too worn.
Kids, unfortunately, don't always know how to check for tire treads or tire pressure. A big part of the reason for this lack of knowledge is that only 16 states require that the driver's education curriculum include a lesson specifically on tire maintenance and only seven states require a lesson on vehicle and tire maintenance.
When kids don't learn about tire maintenance in a driver's education program, it is likely that the only other driver safety lessons they will learn will come from their parents. In fact, according to recent surveys, around 3/4 of teen drivers got their information about tire safety from their parents. This is a big problem because only around a third of parents said that they are knowledgeable about tire maintenance.
Driver's education needs to be more comprehensive, and around 300,000 motor vehicle collisions involving inexperienced drivers could be prevented each year with better driver's education.
In particular, teens should learn some simple tests to check on their tires. One of the simplest is the Lincoln test, which is used to determine if a tire is too worn. To do this test, a teen should put a penny in the tread of the tire. If the top of Lincoln's head is showing when the penny is inside of the tread of the tire, this is a sign that the treads are too worn and that the tire should be replaced in order to reduce the risk that a motor vehicle collision will occur.
A Fairfield County personal injury lawyer at Vishno Law Firm can help after a collision. Call 888-222-1688 today. Serving Fairfield County and all over Connecticut, including Bridgeport, Norwalk, Stamford, Danbury, Waterbury and Shelton.