The Dangers of Distracted Driving: A Cautionary Tale

In this sobering episode of "The White Car," we revisit a harrowing experience that had a profound impact on Laura and Jason, two individuals who were fortunate enough to narrowly avoid disaster. The incident began with Laura's white car suddenly veering towards her, but she managed to make a minor adjustment to her steering and avoid a collision. However, unbeknownst to her, the car was simulating a distracted driver, not watching or aware of their surroundings.

The car had piled into a stationary vehicle at nearly 50 miles an hour, leaving Laura shaken but alive. As the fire crew arrived on the scene, Ian showed Laura exactly what had happened and explained that the white car was simulating her own distracted driving habits at its worst. "You were paying attention to your phone, not the road ahead," Ian said, highlighting the devastating consequences of such a mistake.

Laura's encounter with Keith Fagan, an expert crash investigator, only added fuel to the fire. As she viewed the damage, Laura realized the full extent of her error and the potential harm it could have caused. "If there was a young child in that car," Keith said, his voice heavy with emotion, "the chances are that that child could have been seriously injured, worst case scenario killed." The experience left Laura feeling guilty and regretful, but also determined to change her ways.

The impact of this incident on Laura's life has been profound. She now drives much more cautiously, maintaining a safe speed and avoiding distractions behind the wheel. "I feel a lot safer," she said, smiling. "It's nice when you can keep your hands on the steering wheel." The experience has also taught her to prioritize her actions and put her phone out of reach. "Lives can't wait," she said, reflecting on the lessons she learned from this harrowing encounter.

For Jason, who witnessed Laura's ordeal, the experience was just as impactful. He now drives much more defensively, slowing down at roundabouts and keeping his speed in check. "It had to be bouncing off the roof" when he approached these intersections in the past, but now he takes a more measured approach. The experience has also made him more aware of his own behavior behind the wheel, as well as that of others.

As for Laura's newfound awareness, she says it's been a game-changer. "I feel like I'm a better driver," she said, smiling. "I'm maintaining 30 miles an hour and being much more cautious." The experience has also helped her calm down behind the wheel, as she no longer feels the need to grip the dashboard or hang onto the seat.

The lessons learned from this episode are clear: distracted driving is a deadly serious offense that can have devastating consequences. It's a habit that can be broken, but it requires attention and awareness. As Laura puts it, "Lives can't wait." By prioritizing our actions behind the wheel and staying focused on the road ahead, we can avoid such tragedies and create a safer, more responsible driving culture.

In the end, Laura's experience serves as a powerful reminder of the importance of safe driving habits. It's an incident that could have had far more tragic consequences, but ultimately resulted in a newfound awareness and a determination to drive with greater care and attention. As we navigate our daily lives behind the wheel, let us remember the lessons of "The White Car" and strive to become better, safer drivers.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey peter stop red light tonight in a unique experiment we challenge the driving habits of two of britain's worst motorists jason using state-of-the-art technology created exclusively for this experiment we aim to help them change their ways as they come face to face with their own dangerous driving that's pretty bad i'm lost for word this is crash course happily our cars and our roads are safer than they've ever been today cars are four times safer than they were just 15 years ago they're better designed better regulated more rigorously tested and bristling with advanced safety technology and the uk's roads themselves are 25 safer than five years ago as a result of better signage better surfaces and redesigned junctions we have one of the safest roads systems in the whole world where the uk has been in the top three for the last sort of 10 years and road casualties are dropping every year but in spite of that too many of us are still being hurt or killed in cars today almost 400 accidents will have been reported in the uk 64 people will have been seriously injured and five people will have died and in over 90 percent of accidents there's just one person to blame a bad driver i'm afraid if you look at all the police records all the research it's people who cause crashes it's mistakes it's errors it's not looking is the top actual cause of most crashes what can be done well shock tactic campaigns have had a lot of success right around the world like this online ad showing the dangers of applying makeup at the wheel but could the shock of actually experiencing a crash and seeing the results also have a positive effect on people's driving well tonight that's what we want to find out our first dangerous driver is jason what are you doing huh i'm jason redshaw and i live in sunny blackpool i run a small chain of little businesses we have fancy dress shop we hire out uh costumes with a master great collection yeah it's not weighty but it depends how you work with it yeah and we hire out props right now jason drives a bmw z3 sports car put your seatbelt on lad he was nominated by david his business partner of 14 years i nominated jason to be on the show because of his driving habits he tends to be a little bit erratic behind the wheel fabulous jason knows he does some things on the road that he shouldn't and has agreed to take part at david's request and go for what he believes is some expert tuition because nobody'll let me out i've got i'm going i've had one or two three or four cars that have met an untimely end one went into a lamppost one went into the back of a taxi one went into a wall i do think i've been lucky i really do in the car there's probably been a couple of instances where i'd probably come close to even losing my own life i've been caught for speeding twice i'll be honest i've speeded many many many times i'll happily admit what's your speed 140. it's only 30 down here 30 mile an hour yeah well where's the signs whenever i've had a brand new car i've always gone down onto the m55 you can open a car and really push it and see what you can get out of her it's a thrill it's exciting yes it's dangerous i think i did one two five and then the dashboard started to vibrate so it was a case of okay calm down calm down reign it in he tends to not slow down at roundabouts we shouldn't do that around the roundabout bloody race track oh shut up 30 mile an hour there you go i do get um quite aggressive whilst driving get over you what are you doing huh oh how bloody close do you want to get what are you doing many of jason's friends refuse to travel with him and the rest like friend philip don't enjoy it don't look at the geese stick when you're driving i know how to drive fellaini well why is he sticking his nose out he doesn't look at what's going on he doesn't concentrate he doesn't look at the corners and he just doesn't care what's that cyclist i can see him i can see him there's a car stopping here jesus christ most dangerously of all jason shoots red lights like he shot a light yesterday stop red light you are the lights are on red the lights are on red the lights are on red it was on amber it wasn't it's on red it was on amber david it was definitely red the lights were on red and had actually changed from green a full six seconds before jason reached the junction okay preoccupied looking around david can't take any more of jason's bad driving and nominated him for crash course as a last resort i don't think he realizes how dangerous a vehicle is i tend to get a little bit anxious if he's if he's out in the car i've done theory tests driving tests speed awareness tests i'm not sure what else there is to do that would make me curtail my driving scary 90 of us believe that we are above average drivers which is of course impossible like jason though 85 of us admit to acting aggressively in our cars what are you doing tailgating cutting up and screaming at other drivers so why do we act like this anonymity plays a big role you feel secluded within your vehicle other people you can't necessarily see within their vehicle so it might mean that even the most mild-mannered individual on the road would have the propensity to let anger boil over into some sort of aggression and when it's our territory that's being threatened the anger gets very personal indeed many people take territoriality into their car so although they're on a public road their car is part of their territory therefore any threats any perceived aggressive driving towards them might be taken more seriously so is it possible to spot a potentially territorial and aggressive driver before things get nasty people who tend to have greater territoriality within their vehicles will often adorn their vehicles so in america has been a study to show that bumper stickers for instance correlate with instance of road rage similarly ornaments in cars spoilers personalized plates these are the sort of things that mark out someone as having greater territoriality in relation to their car and which might mean that they are more prone to road rage the likeliest road rage culprits are men aged between 35 and 50 and driving blue bmws a demographic jason fits into perfectly what are you doing by and large on the whole aggressive people out there on the road are typically aggressive in life in fact great britain is home to some of the angriest drivers in the whole world with a third of us experiencing an aggressive road rage incident every single week cars certainly level the playing field in terms of let's say physical discrepancies between potential protagonists when you're in the car you might feel that you are cushioned from the social consequences of any actions that you do and then it turns out that actually there's chapped rather a big chat so that anonymity can break down very quickly for the majority of us road rage means a bit of swearing and some creative sign language but if you do come up against an aggressive and angry driver the solution is simple be polite apologize and get out of their way then you won't be involved when it all goes wrong for them what are you doing after seeing jason's aggressive driving on public roads we took him to our private road network in suffolk he thinks he's simply here for a day's intensive tuition with advanced driving instructor ian palmer so as i'm saying i really want you to start thinking about your safety that's the most important thing it says he's unaware he'll be involved in a crash and with ian alongside him jason's on best behavior tell you what i'm doing really well with this car he shows that beneath the aggression there's actually a considerate and competent driver do you know why i think you're doing really well because i'm probably more concentrating on the car because there's less distractions good and you're using both hands yes yes even david who's come to watch is surprised he never pulls away from the lights that slowly but how will jason cope when he comes face to face with his own dangerous driving jason redshaw from blackpool is a dangerously bad driver and one of his biggest vices is jumping red lights up red light it was on amber it was definitely red but after a few hours on our private road network with an advanced driving instructor by his side jason's feeling comfortable behind the wheel and proving what a good driver he can be tell you what i'm doing really well with this car but he's unaware that he's about to experience first hand what can happen when people jump red lights so um yeah when you're ready let's drive on if you look ahead we're coming round to these road works just a little bit further so what what have you got now i've got a bmw z3 oh right so having a look what color are the lights we're on red okay nice and smoothly and just stopping just here whoa whoa that's lovely excellent shot now stay focused there we go i nearly went for first gear then nice and straight and straight and straight good oh hello have you stalled look out so what exactly just happened well the mini out on the road was robotic and remotely driven by jason from an identical static vehicle in our studio live camera and sound feeds from the robot car to the studio car made jason feel as if he was really driving that's it good the bmw which hit jason was also robotic and controlled by one of our technicians the whole setup was specifically designed for this experiment to make jason's simulated experience as realistic as possible that wasn't funny can you see what car that is that was my bmw wasn't it at that split second when it happened i felt like i was smirking and grinning um and i think it was because i didn't know how to react i didn't know how to feel that was you driving your bmw through a red traffic light jason and that's the consequences when the vehicle door opened that's when it hit me i think i'm lost for words i'm shocked i feel my legs are shaking my hands are shaking i feel like i've just been in a car crash and that's how people lose their lives oh god you're right kind of feel really funny that realization of that was me coming towards the vehicle it kind of hit home that um that's my driving and that's what i think scared me and upset me and then shook me up a bit as soon as we pulled up i could see him shaking i could actually see his hands physically shaking are you shook up a little bit yeah i was shocked it's so scary so scary my tummy's all all churned and so the the point is is that was me in the other car yeah one yeah moments later he was throwing up in the bathroom so yeah in real life the bmw driver may have had time to break before impact or the midi may have managed to move out of the way but a hard side impact like this is all too often the result of a driver jumping a red light to show jason the human costs of this accident crash investigator keith fagan takes him and david for a short guided tour of the wrecked car oh my word jason you can see that there's a considerable amount of damage to your car okay yeah however i've looked inside and there's no intrusion into the floor well so the chances are that you would have had injuries yes but you would probably survive that moving on to the mini you can see the intrusion into the door you can just see how it's pushed across yep and what the effect that would have on the driver and the seat is a huge amount of lateral movement that way potentially fatal and that would cause crush injuries to the passenger again potentially fatal yes the organs inside the body shake up quite dreadfully and more often not the aorta may be severed yes so yeah death occurs now the fallout for you is is that you have got to live with that on your mind that you've actually killed somebody yeah for the rest of your life for the rest of your life yeah i wouldn't want blood in my hands from you know taking someone's life and ruining a whole family i i just would never want that not only that the police turn up and the first thing they're going to do to you is arrest you for death by dangerous driving and if convicted that carries a sentence for maximum 14 years but you've got to live with that stigma all your life the fact that you've killed someone that you've had a prison sentence well i don't think i'll be running any more red lights that's that's a definite assert definitely i'd be interested to see now what what he's like when i get back in the car with him because that's got to stick in your head it's got a sticking it's stuck in my head it's easy to turn around and say well i won't ever speed again or i won't ever run a red light again but i have to put that into practice to make sure that that what i saw this afternoon doesn't happen so i have to put that into practice myself and make sure that i never get into one of those situations and see two vehicles smashed up like that because that's really scary we'll find out later if jason's experience did change the way he drives after the break two more drivers take our test a perfectly good driver it is so distressing and a young distracted driver whose mother worries for her safety during your lifetime you're likely to be involved in three or four car crashes and more often than not if you're a good driver it won't be your fault sixty percent of crashes happen at junctions and the most common way is to be hit from behind rear end shunts count for around a quarter of all crashes on our roads but however safely you drive others seem prepared to take needless risks at the wheel driving with no hands doing their paperwork reading a book or even eating a whole plate of chicken chow mein so is there anything you can do to avoid being in a crash well bizarrely statistics seem to show simple but slightly strange rules you can follow number one don't be a doctor we found that the profession most likely to have an accident were gps general practitioners about 29 of them have had an accident or made a claim on their car insurance versus the national average of 13 overall um they're not on their own though in the top 10 of professions that are most likely to have made a claim uh there are eight eight healthcare or medical professionals on that list number two don't drive a black car black cars are 12 more likely to be enacted than a white car for example and that leaps up to 47 more likely during dusk and dawn black cars blend into the road the background and other traffic more than any other color of car and number three don't drive during rush hour during peak times like morning or evening rush hours uh it's actually one in six uh people who drive during those times are likely to have an accident versus one in ten on average so it might not come as a surprise that when there are more cars on the road you're more likely to have an accident as we saw earlier the experience of our simulated crash felt absolutely real for jason so how on earth could that be possible well to put our simulator through rigorous testing we first tried it out on a perfectly good driver to see if the simulation would be effective enough for our experiment to succeed i'm nicola and i've been drive diving since i was 18 so probably almost 20 years now um and i'm probably the most confident driver in my family i have three little ones i have a six-year-old boy urban four-year-old girl lilo and a one-year-old girl alba we are constantly going to and fro from different places so we have the main school drop-off we then have the preschool drop-off and then we might go and visit hannah and granddad in the afternoon then we have to pick up the older children from school and then we might run straight off to a swimming club and then football club in rainbows and brownies and all those kinds of things so we're constantly in and out of the car it's crazy but it's fun getting nicola to test our simulator was also an opportunity for us to analyze what happens when things go wrong in a way that they could for any of us through no fault of our own so how realistic did the crash feel for nicola i'm so sorry it felt completely real i felt i feel like i've had a car accident are you all right i think so i'm a bit shaky to be honest it feels like i've had a car accident it felt to me in real life like i had a blow out in the back it was the worst possible time that could possibly happen i'm going i'm just totally shaking so why did it feel so real because the images of the road outside were all nicola could see through every window and because the familiar noises of a moving car were all nicola could hear and because when she accelerated braked or turned she could clearly see and hear that happening her brain was quickly duped into thinking she was driving a car for real it was completely a realistic experience even when the guys on the outside car came up to the side i was like hi how you doing because it was almost like they were really there similarly when my speed got up i was like oh my gosh i've got my seat belt on i was literally reaching to put my seatbelt on after nicola had been driving for a couple of hours it started to feel normal in every day she became relaxed and confident at the wheel because it was such a long time with very little break um it was completely an immersive experience so when we simulated a tire blowout at 45 miles an hour she believed she was really crashing oh my god you're using shock in order to to throw somebody out of a comfortable environment albeit simulated into one where an accident has occurred and that sort of shock can be very jarring it certainly is very jarring when it occurs in the real world and essentially you are simulating that that transition from a very stable environment to one where there is a certain crisis while a tyre blowout on a modern car will not often be as catastrophic as our simulation it still clearly demonstrates just how fast everything can happen and what many of us consider a low speed i've always trusted myself as being quite a good driver especially having the kids in the back oh my goodness i'm so aware what makes me quite emotional thinking about it but i'm so aware of my little babies in the back and even when i drive my own it's the idea that i've got to get back to my babies you know like you're coming out here today i'm like i've got to be really careful on the road because i've got to get back to my babies at 45 miles an hour there was just 1.56 seconds between our simulated blowout and nicola hitting those palmed cars no time at all for her to take any evasive action it's a simple but obvious lesson the faster you drive the less time you have to react and the worse the results if anything goes wrong it's so distressing like i haven't even been in a car accident so it's nothing i can compare it to but you know when you see things like this on the side of the road and you and you think oh my god i hope everyone's okay oh my god wheels do fly off and you do get blowouts and you do get you know you can get clipped by somebody else or whatever that's horrendous because no car seat would protect a little one in that would it be completely squished it's horrendous it was so real driving the car you don't have time to think no you don't i would i just don't have time to think all of a sudden i was just in the pile of cars due to the experience i really feel like i've had a car accident i feel like it's something that happened in my my life in the days and the weeks following the experience i became more careful than ever so it's definitely affected the way that i drive yeah like nicola at some point we'll drive with others in our car but whether that's a good or bad thing depends on who those passengers are passengers can be a distraction especially when those passengers aren't necessarily drivers themselves young passengers who haven't passed their test and certainly children might not necessarily understand how dangerous the road is and therefore might be more likely to engage in conversational distracting behavior with you when really you need to be focusing on what's happening on the road and what if they're a back seat driver like jason's friend phillip well just slow down a bit because you're gonna get the curb the idea of a backseat driver can actually be protective in the sense that they might be able to point something out to you that you have uh missed children on the pavement there however there is also the risk that it will be seen as criticism don't look at the gear stick look at the road well yeah i know how to drive how to tackle you and you can imagine that um some distraction could arise just from the idea that the driver is irritated with feeling that they are being criticized pulling it up our final bad driver has been nominated for the show by a nervous passenger meet laura a young driver who gets easily distracted at the wheel my name is laura jane tamse i'm 22 years old i live in bletchingley in surrey with my mum and my dad and my daughter lily and i'm studying to get my higher qualification in beauty say hi mom the nervous passenger who nominated laura is her mom car journey with laura it's normally pretty horrendous i can understand why my mom has nominated me because i know my driving isn't perfect but i've prevented so many accidents from happening like the other day it was really bad like i genuinely care i was on my phone and i was driving along like this and then my car was going off into the other lane and there was a lorry and i literally had to like swerve so much i went up the curb a little bit i've been really worried about her driving and of course her having an accident you know if she's really late anything might have happened so as a parent you you know you are very responsible hi darling if anything really bad was to happen i was to have a car accident and die like i wouldn't want to do that to my mum and dad i wouldn't want to have to put them through that distracted drivers like laura cause over two and a half thousand crashes every day in the uk and one in three car occupants killed or seriously injured on our roads are like laura under 25. she doesn't pay attention just things like brushing my hair using hand cream don't crash don't grasp i do eat and drink when i'm driving if you come into my lane now i'm not gonna be happy she'll attempt to put her makeup on put your lipstick away i don't think laura listens to me whatsoever when we're in the car let me just phone the media are you not somebody i've never once been caught on the mobile phone getting caught would be serious for laura oh where's my phone because driving whilst using a handheld phone isn't just dangerous it's a criminal offense i get bored really easily so if my phone's going off i'll just be like okay cool we all have not met up since just after christmas something like maybe on facebook or instagram hey charlotte we miss you that's getting my attention more than my driving that idiot man he didn't do anything wrong so why is it dangerous to do other stuff while driving what most drivers don't realize is that their brain actually prioritizes what it's doing at any one time you think you're multitasking but you're not so when you're concentrating on something inside the car you're missing important stuff outside it like ben's that's why people often report oh i never i never saw that junction what happened i passed that last few miles and never even noticed it's because your brain for that moment has been prioritizing something else and our 21st century world is full of distractions laura's one of 43 of women in the uk who admit to doing their makeup while driving putting your face on during the commute may seem harmless enough but it causes half a million shunts and crashes every year sixty percent of us admit to sharing laura's eating and drinking habits having a quick nibble behind the wheel but as laura clearly illustrated it's modern technology that's the biggest distraction by far mobile phone use and now smartphone use in particular behind the wheel is one of the biggest issues in road safety today using a phone at the wheel makes you four times more likely to crash yet fifty percent of young drivers admit they do it we've done a simulator survey where it showed that if you were using a smartphone you were actually more dangerous than if you'd had some alcohol or some cannabis in your blood system and it's because it reduces your reaction time you don't know what's going on and it's all down to your brain being focused more on the smartphone than on the driving and with a smartphone there's a whole lot more to be focused on than just calls the biggest issue is social media people just seem to be hooked on it they just can't seem to do without it they have to spend every minute checking their status and so on and what we found was that up to 38 reaction time was slower because people were accessing social media on their smartphone if you take five seconds to read a status update at 60 miles an hour you travel more than the length of a football pitch without looking at the road now watch laura reading out a text message but we all have not met up since just after christmas so when are you all free for an evening meal and with just an occasional glance at the road ahead she was concentrating on her phone for a total of 15 seconds the latest worldwide craze is taking selfies and videos whilst driving then posting them on social media i'll leave this video to demonstrate why that's not a good idea thankfully both women did survive to post this selfie from hospital hey peter laura is a very distracted driver and her mother nominated her hoping a day's training in our robotic simulator can improve her driving she thinks she's here for a very rainy day's training with advanced driving instructor ian just pop yourself in there okay but she has no idea how that training is going to end just release the brakes you'll see some cones coming up now in the middle of the road can you see those oh gosh that's it feeding the wheel between your hands your right hand good left hand after laura's had time to get relaxed in the car back again that's it good there we go ian sets her a little challenge get your mobile phone okay all right i'm going to want you to send your mum a text okay all right but while you're driving i can do that i'll try okay and send your text as well now that's going through the card that's it look where you're going a little bit quicker round to the right distractions like mobile phones are very dangerous and you're not you've not got your full attention on the road that's it back to the left again and therefore anything can happen basically what happened i crashed okay and that was a cone yeah how about if that was a child that would just run out in front of you i know i'd feel really bad what ian asks laura to do next will simulate what happens every time she reads her phone on the move once we've got the car nice and straight and we're driving along i want you to shut your eyes okay five seconds okay all right now that's quite a long time isn't it if you're doing 40 50 miles an hour and you're not looking where you're going for five seconds i could have gone you're gonna cover the length of the football pitch yeah so as long as there's no football it's done well yes look out pick up the speed i shut five four three two one and one okay nice and easy all right good all right what happened there i crashed we're on a nice open area here aren't we but if you're on a normal road not only going to crash into into stationary obviously but you could swerve across into oncoming traffic yeah and then you know you're you're doubling the impact speed and it's going to have from some fairly horrendous consequences right of course there's still one last scenario left for laura to experience on her next run around the circuit laura will come face to face with this another fully robotic car this white car represents laura's distracted driving at its worst and just as laura did in the exercise where she closed her eyes the white car will drift across the road but this time straight into the path of the mini laura's driving so laura will come face to face with her distracted self off you go then when you're ready thank you oh so oh yeah that might help awkward okay so here we go we'll keep it nice and straight nicely with the hands squeeze on the gas that's it good will the shock of what happens next be enough to make laura change her ways as i say just keep it nice and steady so we really want to focus on the cars on the left laura thompson doesn't know it but she is seconds away from a car crash a white car coming towards her is about to drift into her path straighten up again now what happens then is down to her reactions oh my god amazingly laura fully concentrating for once managed to avoid a head-on crash as the white car starts to veer towards her she makes a minor adjustment to her steering and manages to avoid it however the white car is simulating a distracted driver not watching and not aware they're veering across the road out of control it piles into a stationary car at almost 50 miles an hour good just stop in there then laura is unaware of what happened behind her i don't know if you looked in your mirrors no that car swerved but he's crashed into those parked cars oh crikey oh my god as the fire crew arrive at the crash scene ian shows laura exactly what did just happen and explains that the white car was simulating her distracted driving at its worst so laura that's you you're not paying attention the road ahead you're on your phone you just swerve that's quite heavy you see how it pitches it nearly rolls over yeah that's pretty bad next laura heads out to the crash site with expert crash investigator keith fagan laura as you see we've arrived at the crash scene yeah okay that's your car over there oh my goodness you swerved across the road because you were distracted and you hit this car here now if you can imagine that there was a young child in a baby seat in here yeah and at 50 miles an hour the chances are that that child could have been seriously injured worst case scenario killed as a result of the collision honestly i can't even think about the reaction if there was a child in the car i can't bear to think about it it's bad enough with an adult yeah but with a child the emotional effect on the families the parents the grandparents everybody involved from experience i can tell you the emotional effect that it has on emergency services is colossal okay one of my close friends was hit by a drunk driver and unfortunately she passed away obviously it's completely different situations i'm not going around drinking and driving but it's similar my actions can lead could lead to a death and after seeing what her family went through and what i meant there as a close friend of her i wouldn't wish that upon anybody if we move over to your vehicle now at 50 miles an hour the chances are you may have survived this collision okay but you may well have been seriously injured the issue with this is the police arrive and they see you and one of the first things they're going to do is have you got a mobile phone and they're going to take it off you because they think you may have been texting or distracted by your mobile phone okay if they think that then there's a very strong possibility you would be arrested for death by dangerous driving oh my goodness i really i regret the way that i have been driving and like i've been fortunate enough to not have any serious accidents or hurt anybody yet but like i said yeah i completely regret the way that i have been driving so did laura and jason's experiences help them overcome their bad driving habits i do feel i'm a better driver i'm maintaining 30 miles an hour i'm certainly more cautious and more aware of what's going on around me quite hard for you to have both hands on the wheel and it has calmed me down as well it's novel to see you driving so gently i think david's a lot more relaxed now normally belt down here and it had to be bouncing off the roof when he's approaching the roundabout he's slowing down at the roundabout rather than just keeping the speed up and i'm not feeling like i need to be gripping the dashboard or hanging onto the seat i do like the way you take the round bags now they still don't get my face squashed up against the glass and the same with the the traffic lights you know is definitely a noticeable difference now these are the traffic lights that i've had an issue with a couple of times and that was okay no no i wouldn't run a red light no yeah it's a lot nicer experience in the car now for laura the experience had an equally big impact laura is driving a lot more confidently she's not irresponsible anymore she doesn't pick up the phone she's very very good i feel a lot safer and i think it's nice when you do keep back hands on the steering wheel the things that i was doing are just ridiculous like text messages can wait phone calls can wait but lives can't i see so many people on their phone and i just look at them now and i'm like get off your phone i can go to bed without even worrying or waiting up for you to come home i know it's silly at your age but i don't think that anybody who's got children never stops worrying about them really really happy i feel everybody who's learning to drive and on the road should go through a similar process from the start and i think it would certainly save a lot of lives youhey peter stop red light tonight in a unique experiment we challenge the driving habits of two of britain's worst motorists jason using state-of-the-art technology created exclusively for this experiment we aim to help them change their ways as they come face to face with their own dangerous driving that's pretty bad i'm lost for word this is crash course happily our cars and our roads are safer than they've ever been today cars are four times safer than they were just 15 years ago they're better designed better regulated more rigorously tested and bristling with advanced safety technology and the uk's roads themselves are 25 safer than five years ago as a result of better signage better surfaces and redesigned junctions we have one of the safest roads systems in the whole world where the uk has been in the top three for the last sort of 10 years and road casualties are dropping every year but in spite of that too many of us are still being hurt or killed in cars today almost 400 accidents will have been reported in the uk 64 people will have been seriously injured and five people will have died and in over 90 percent of accidents there's just one person to blame a bad driver i'm afraid if you look at all the police records all the research it's people who cause crashes it's mistakes it's errors it's not looking is the top actual cause of most crashes what can be done well shock tactic campaigns have had a lot of success right around the world like this online ad showing the dangers of applying makeup at the wheel but could the shock of actually experiencing a crash and seeing the results also have a positive effect on people's driving well tonight that's what we want to find out our first dangerous driver is jason what are you doing huh i'm jason redshaw and i live in sunny blackpool i run a small chain of little businesses we have fancy dress shop we hire out uh costumes with a master great collection yeah it's not weighty but it depends how you work with it yeah and we hire out props right now jason drives a bmw z3 sports car put your seatbelt on lad he was nominated by david his business partner of 14 years i nominated jason to be on the show because of his driving habits he tends to be a little bit erratic behind the wheel fabulous jason knows he does some things on the road that he shouldn't and has agreed to take part at david's request and go for what he believes is some expert tuition because nobody'll let me out i've got i'm going i've had one or two three or four cars that have met an untimely end one went into a lamppost one went into the back of a taxi one went into a wall i do think i've been lucky i really do in the car there's probably been a couple of instances where i'd probably come close to even losing my own life i've been caught for speeding twice i'll be honest i've speeded many many many times i'll happily admit what's your speed 140. it's only 30 down here 30 mile an hour yeah well where's the signs whenever i've had a brand new car i've always gone down onto the m55 you can open a car and really push it and see what you can get out of her it's a thrill it's exciting yes it's dangerous i think i did one two five and then the dashboard started to vibrate so it was a case of okay calm down calm down reign it in he tends to not slow down at roundabouts we shouldn't do that around the roundabout bloody race track oh shut up 30 mile an hour there you go i do get um quite aggressive whilst driving get over you what are you doing huh oh how bloody close do you want to get what are you doing many of jason's friends refuse to travel with him and the rest like friend philip don't enjoy it don't look at the geese stick when you're driving i know how to drive fellaini well why is he sticking his nose out he doesn't look at what's going on he doesn't concentrate he doesn't look at the corners and he just doesn't care what's that cyclist i can see him i can see him there's a car stopping here jesus christ most dangerously of all jason shoots red lights like he shot a light yesterday stop red light you are the lights are on red the lights are on red the lights are on red it was on amber it wasn't it's on red it was on amber david it was definitely red the lights were on red and had actually changed from green a full six seconds before jason reached the junction okay preoccupied looking around david can't take any more of jason's bad driving and nominated him for crash course as a last resort i don't think he realizes how dangerous a vehicle is i tend to get a little bit anxious if he's if he's out in the car i've done theory tests driving tests speed awareness tests i'm not sure what else there is to do that would make me curtail my driving scary 90 of us believe that we are above average drivers which is of course impossible like jason though 85 of us admit to acting aggressively in our cars what are you doing tailgating cutting up and screaming at other drivers so why do we act like this anonymity plays a big role you feel secluded within your vehicle other people you can't necessarily see within their vehicle so it might mean that even the most mild-mannered individual on the road would have the propensity to let anger boil over into some sort of aggression and when it's our territory that's being threatened the anger gets very personal indeed many people take territoriality into their car so although they're on a public road their car is part of their territory therefore any threats any perceived aggressive driving towards them might be taken more seriously so is it possible to spot a potentially territorial and aggressive driver before things get nasty people who tend to have greater territoriality within their vehicles will often adorn their vehicles so in america has been a study to show that bumper stickers for instance correlate with instance of road rage similarly ornaments in cars spoilers personalized plates these are the sort of things that mark out someone as having greater territoriality in relation to their car and which might mean that they are more prone to road rage the likeliest road rage culprits are men aged between 35 and 50 and driving blue bmws a demographic jason fits into perfectly what are you doing by and large on the whole aggressive people out there on the road are typically aggressive in life in fact great britain is home to some of the angriest drivers in the whole world with a third of us experiencing an aggressive road rage incident every single week cars certainly level the playing field in terms of let's say physical discrepancies between potential protagonists when you're in the car you might feel that you are cushioned from the social consequences of any actions that you do and then it turns out that actually there's chapped rather a big chat so that anonymity can break down very quickly for the majority of us road rage means a bit of swearing and some creative sign language but if you do come up against an aggressive and angry driver the solution is simple be polite apologize and get out of their way then you won't be involved when it all goes wrong for them what are you doing after seeing jason's aggressive driving on public roads we took him to our private road network in suffolk he thinks he's simply here for a day's intensive tuition with advanced driving instructor ian palmer so as i'm saying i really want you to start thinking about your safety that's the most important thing it says he's unaware he'll be involved in a crash and with ian alongside him jason's on best behavior tell you what i'm doing really well with this car he shows that beneath the aggression there's actually a considerate and competent driver do you know why i think you're doing really well because i'm probably more concentrating on the car because there's less distractions good and you're using both hands yes yes even david who's come to watch is surprised he never pulls away from the lights that slowly but how will jason cope when he comes face to face with his own dangerous driving jason redshaw from blackpool is a dangerously bad driver and one of his biggest vices is jumping red lights up red light it was on amber it was definitely red but after a few hours on our private road network with an advanced driving instructor by his side jason's feeling comfortable behind the wheel and proving what a good driver he can be tell you what i'm doing really well with this car but he's unaware that he's about to experience first hand what can happen when people jump red lights so um yeah when you're ready let's drive on if you look ahead we're coming round to these road works just a little bit further so what what have you got now i've got a bmw z3 oh right so having a look what color are the lights we're on red okay nice and smoothly and just stopping just here whoa whoa that's lovely excellent shot now stay focused there we go i nearly went for first gear then nice and straight and straight and straight good oh hello have you stalled look out so what exactly just happened well the mini out on the road was robotic and remotely driven by jason from an identical static vehicle in our studio live camera and sound feeds from the robot car to the studio car made jason feel as if he was really driving that's it good the bmw which hit jason was also robotic and controlled by one of our technicians the whole setup was specifically designed for this experiment to make jason's simulated experience as realistic as possible that wasn't funny can you see what car that is that was my bmw wasn't it at that split second when it happened i felt like i was smirking and grinning um and i think it was because i didn't know how to react i didn't know how to feel that was you driving your bmw through a red traffic light jason and that's the consequences when the vehicle door opened that's when it hit me i think i'm lost for words i'm shocked i feel my legs are shaking my hands are shaking i feel like i've just been in a car crash and that's how people lose their lives oh god you're right kind of feel really funny that realization of that was me coming towards the vehicle it kind of hit home that um that's my driving and that's what i think scared me and upset me and then shook me up a bit as soon as we pulled up i could see him shaking i could actually see his hands physically shaking are you shook up a little bit yeah i was shocked it's so scary so scary my tummy's all all churned and so the the point is is that was me in the other car yeah one yeah moments later he was throwing up in the bathroom so yeah in real life the bmw driver may have had time to break before impact or the midi may have managed to move out of the way but a hard side impact like this is all too often the result of a driver jumping a red light to show jason the human costs of this accident crash investigator keith fagan takes him and david for a short guided tour of the wrecked car oh my word jason you can see that there's a considerable amount of damage to your car okay yeah however i've looked inside and there's no intrusion into the floor well so the chances are that you would have had injuries yes but you would probably survive that moving on to the mini you can see the intrusion into the door you can just see how it's pushed across yep and what the effect that would have on the driver and the seat is a huge amount of lateral movement that way potentially fatal and that would cause crush injuries to the passenger again potentially fatal yes the organs inside the body shake up quite dreadfully and more often not the aorta may be severed yes so yeah death occurs now the fallout for you is is that you have got to live with that on your mind that you've actually killed somebody yeah for the rest of your life for the rest of your life yeah i wouldn't want blood in my hands from you know taking someone's life and ruining a whole family i i just would never want that not only that the police turn up and the first thing they're going to do to you is arrest you for death by dangerous driving and if convicted that carries a sentence for maximum 14 years but you've got to live with that stigma all your life the fact that you've killed someone that you've had a prison sentence well i don't think i'll be running any more red lights that's that's a definite assert definitely i'd be interested to see now what what he's like when i get back in the car with him because that's got to stick in your head it's got a sticking it's stuck in my head it's easy to turn around and say well i won't ever speed again or i won't ever run a red light again but i have to put that into practice to make sure that that what i saw this afternoon doesn't happen so i have to put that into practice myself and make sure that i never get into one of those situations and see two vehicles smashed up like that because that's really scary we'll find out later if jason's experience did change the way he drives after the break two more drivers take our test a perfectly good driver it is so distressing and a young distracted driver whose mother worries for her safety during your lifetime you're likely to be involved in three or four car crashes and more often than not if you're a good driver it won't be your fault sixty percent of crashes happen at junctions and the most common way is to be hit from behind rear end shunts count for around a quarter of all crashes on our roads but however safely you drive others seem prepared to take needless risks at the wheel driving with no hands doing their paperwork reading a book or even eating a whole plate of chicken chow mein so is there anything you can do to avoid being in a crash well bizarrely statistics seem to show simple but slightly strange rules you can follow number one don't be a doctor we found that the profession most likely to have an accident were gps general practitioners about 29 of them have had an accident or made a claim on their car insurance versus the national average of 13 overall um they're not on their own though in the top 10 of professions that are most likely to have made a claim uh there are eight eight healthcare or medical professionals on that list number two don't drive a black car black cars are 12 more likely to be enacted than a white car for example and that leaps up to 47 more likely during dusk and dawn black cars blend into the road the background and other traffic more than any other color of car and number three don't drive during rush hour during peak times like morning or evening rush hours uh it's actually one in six uh people who drive during those times are likely to have an accident versus one in ten on average so it might not come as a surprise that when there are more cars on the road you're more likely to have an accident as we saw earlier the experience of our simulated crash felt absolutely real for jason so how on earth could that be possible well to put our simulator through rigorous testing we first tried it out on a perfectly good driver to see if the simulation would be effective enough for our experiment to succeed i'm nicola and i've been drive diving since i was 18 so probably almost 20 years now um and i'm probably the most confident driver in my family i have three little ones i have a six-year-old boy urban four-year-old girl lilo and a one-year-old girl alba we are constantly going to and fro from different places so we have the main school drop-off we then have the preschool drop-off and then we might go and visit hannah and granddad in the afternoon then we have to pick up the older children from school and then we might run straight off to a swimming club and then football club in rainbows and brownies and all those kinds of things so we're constantly in and out of the car it's crazy but it's fun getting nicola to test our simulator was also an opportunity for us to analyze what happens when things go wrong in a way that they could for any of us through no fault of our own so how realistic did the crash feel for nicola i'm so sorry it felt completely real i felt i feel like i've had a car accident are you all right i think so i'm a bit shaky to be honest it feels like i've had a car accident it felt to me in real life like i had a blow out in the back it was the worst possible time that could possibly happen i'm going i'm just totally shaking so why did it feel so real because the images of the road outside were all nicola could see through every window and because the familiar noises of a moving car were all nicola could hear and because when she accelerated braked or turned she could clearly see and hear that happening her brain was quickly duped into thinking she was driving a car for real it was completely a realistic experience even when the guys on the outside car came up to the side i was like hi how you doing because it was almost like they were really there similarly when my speed got up i was like oh my gosh i've got my seat belt on i was literally reaching to put my seatbelt on after nicola had been driving for a couple of hours it started to feel normal in every day she became relaxed and confident at the wheel because it was such a long time with very little break um it was completely an immersive experience so when we simulated a tire blowout at 45 miles an hour she believed she was really crashing oh my god you're using shock in order to to throw somebody out of a comfortable environment albeit simulated into one where an accident has occurred and that sort of shock can be very jarring it certainly is very jarring when it occurs in the real world and essentially you are simulating that that transition from a very stable environment to one where there is a certain crisis while a tyre blowout on a modern car will not often be as catastrophic as our simulation it still clearly demonstrates just how fast everything can happen and what many of us consider a low speed i've always trusted myself as being quite a good driver especially having the kids in the back oh my goodness i'm so aware what makes me quite emotional thinking about it but i'm so aware of my little babies in the back and even when i drive my own it's the idea that i've got to get back to my babies you know like you're coming out here today i'm like i've got to be really careful on the road because i've got to get back to my babies at 45 miles an hour there was just 1.56 seconds between our simulated blowout and nicola hitting those palmed cars no time at all for her to take any evasive action it's a simple but obvious lesson the faster you drive the less time you have to react and the worse the results if anything goes wrong it's so distressing like i haven't even been in a car accident so it's nothing i can compare it to but you know when you see things like this on the side of the road and you and you think oh my god i hope everyone's okay oh my god wheels do fly off and you do get blowouts and you do get you know you can get clipped by somebody else or whatever that's horrendous because no car seat would protect a little one in that would it be completely squished it's horrendous it was so real driving the car you don't have time to think no you don't i would i just don't have time to think all of a sudden i was just in the pile of cars due to the experience i really feel like i've had a car accident i feel like it's something that happened in my my life in the days and the weeks following the experience i became more careful than ever so it's definitely affected the way that i drive yeah like nicola at some point we'll drive with others in our car but whether that's a good or bad thing depends on who those passengers are passengers can be a distraction especially when those passengers aren't necessarily drivers themselves young passengers who haven't passed their test and certainly children might not necessarily understand how dangerous the road is and therefore might be more likely to engage in conversational distracting behavior with you when really you need to be focusing on what's happening on the road and what if they're a back seat driver like jason's friend phillip well just slow down a bit because you're gonna get the curb the idea of a backseat driver can actually be protective in the sense that they might be able to point something out to you that you have uh missed children on the pavement there however there is also the risk that it will be seen as criticism don't look at the gear stick look at the road well yeah i know how to drive how to tackle you and you can imagine that um some distraction could arise just from the idea that the driver is irritated with feeling that they are being criticized pulling it up our final bad driver has been nominated for the show by a nervous passenger meet laura a young driver who gets easily distracted at the wheel my name is laura jane tamse i'm 22 years old i live in bletchingley in surrey with my mum and my dad and my daughter lily and i'm studying to get my higher qualification in beauty say hi mom the nervous passenger who nominated laura is her mom car journey with laura it's normally pretty horrendous i can understand why my mom has nominated me because i know my driving isn't perfect but i've prevented so many accidents from happening like the other day it was really bad like i genuinely care i was on my phone and i was driving along like this and then my car was going off into the other lane and there was a lorry and i literally had to like swerve so much i went up the curb a little bit i've been really worried about her driving and of course her having an accident you know if she's really late anything might have happened so as a parent you you know you are very responsible hi darling if anything really bad was to happen i was to have a car accident and die like i wouldn't want to do that to my mum and dad i wouldn't want to have to put them through that distracted drivers like laura cause over two and a half thousand crashes every day in the uk and one in three car occupants killed or seriously injured on our roads are like laura under 25. she doesn't pay attention just things like brushing my hair using hand cream don't crash don't grasp i do eat and drink when i'm driving if you come into my lane now i'm not gonna be happy she'll attempt to put her makeup on put your lipstick away i don't think laura listens to me whatsoever when we're in the car let me just phone the media are you not somebody i've never once been caught on the mobile phone getting caught would be serious for laura oh where's my phone because driving whilst using a handheld phone isn't just dangerous it's a criminal offense i get bored really easily so if my phone's going off i'll just be like okay cool we all have not met up since just after christmas something like maybe on facebook or instagram hey charlotte we miss you that's getting my attention more than my driving that idiot man he didn't do anything wrong so why is it dangerous to do other stuff while driving what most drivers don't realize is that their brain actually prioritizes what it's doing at any one time you think you're multitasking but you're not so when you're concentrating on something inside the car you're missing important stuff outside it like ben's that's why people often report oh i never i never saw that junction what happened i passed that last few miles and never even noticed it's because your brain for that moment has been prioritizing something else and our 21st century world is full of distractions laura's one of 43 of women in the uk who admit to doing their makeup while driving putting your face on during the commute may seem harmless enough but it causes half a million shunts and crashes every year sixty percent of us admit to sharing laura's eating and drinking habits having a quick nibble behind the wheel but as laura clearly illustrated it's modern technology that's the biggest distraction by far mobile phone use and now smartphone use in particular behind the wheel is one of the biggest issues in road safety today using a phone at the wheel makes you four times more likely to crash yet fifty percent of young drivers admit they do it we've done a simulator survey where it showed that if you were using a smartphone you were actually more dangerous than if you'd had some alcohol or some cannabis in your blood system and it's because it reduces your reaction time you don't know what's going on and it's all down to your brain being focused more on the smartphone than on the driving and with a smartphone there's a whole lot more to be focused on than just calls the biggest issue is social media people just seem to be hooked on it they just can't seem to do without it they have to spend every minute checking their status and so on and what we found was that up to 38 reaction time was slower because people were accessing social media on their smartphone if you take five seconds to read a status update at 60 miles an hour you travel more than the length of a football pitch without looking at the road now watch laura reading out a text message but we all have not met up since just after christmas so when are you all free for an evening meal and with just an occasional glance at the road ahead she was concentrating on her phone for a total of 15 seconds the latest worldwide craze is taking selfies and videos whilst driving then posting them on social media i'll leave this video to demonstrate why that's not a good idea thankfully both women did survive to post this selfie from hospital hey peter laura is a very distracted driver and her mother nominated her hoping a day's training in our robotic simulator can improve her driving she thinks she's here for a very rainy day's training with advanced driving instructor ian just pop yourself in there okay but she has no idea how that training is going to end just release the brakes you'll see some cones coming up now in the middle of the road can you see those oh gosh that's it feeding the wheel between your hands your right hand good left hand after laura's had time to get relaxed in the car back again that's it good there we go ian sets her a little challenge get your mobile phone okay all right i'm going to want you to send your mum a text okay all right but while you're driving i can do that i'll try okay and send your text as well now that's going through the card that's it look where you're going a little bit quicker round to the right distractions like mobile phones are very dangerous and you're not you've not got your full attention on the road that's it back to the left again and therefore anything can happen basically what happened i crashed okay and that was a cone yeah how about if that was a child that would just run out in front of you i know i'd feel really bad what ian asks laura to do next will simulate what happens every time she reads her phone on the move once we've got the car nice and straight and we're driving along i want you to shut your eyes okay five seconds okay all right now that's quite a long time isn't it if you're doing 40 50 miles an hour and you're not looking where you're going for five seconds i could have gone you're gonna cover the length of the football pitch yeah so as long as there's no football it's done well yes look out pick up the speed i shut five four three two one and one okay nice and easy all right good all right what happened there i crashed we're on a nice open area here aren't we but if you're on a normal road not only going to crash into into stationary obviously but you could swerve across into oncoming traffic yeah and then you know you're you're doubling the impact speed and it's going to have from some fairly horrendous consequences right of course there's still one last scenario left for laura to experience on her next run around the circuit laura will come face to face with this another fully robotic car this white car represents laura's distracted driving at its worst and just as laura did in the exercise where she closed her eyes the white car will drift across the road but this time straight into the path of the mini laura's driving so laura will come face to face with her distracted self off you go then when you're ready thank you oh so oh yeah that might help awkward okay so here we go we'll keep it nice and straight nicely with the hands squeeze on the gas that's it good will the shock of what happens next be enough to make laura change her ways as i say just keep it nice and steady so we really want to focus on the cars on the left laura thompson doesn't know it but she is seconds away from a car crash a white car coming towards her is about to drift into her path straighten up again now what happens then is down to her reactions oh my god amazingly laura fully concentrating for once managed to avoid a head-on crash as the white car starts to veer towards her she makes a minor adjustment to her steering and manages to avoid it however the white car is simulating a distracted driver not watching and not aware they're veering across the road out of control it piles into a stationary car at almost 50 miles an hour good just stop in there then laura is unaware of what happened behind her i don't know if you looked in your mirrors no that car swerved but he's crashed into those parked cars oh crikey oh my god as the fire crew arrive at the crash scene ian shows laura exactly what did just happen and explains that the white car was simulating her distracted driving at its worst so laura that's you you're not paying attention the road ahead you're on your phone you just swerve that's quite heavy you see how it pitches it nearly rolls over yeah that's pretty bad next laura heads out to the crash site with expert crash investigator keith fagan laura as you see we've arrived at the crash scene yeah okay that's your car over there oh my goodness you swerved across the road because you were distracted and you hit this car here now if you can imagine that there was a young child in a baby seat in here yeah and at 50 miles an hour the chances are that that child could have been seriously injured worst case scenario killed as a result of the collision honestly i can't even think about the reaction if there was a child in the car i can't bear to think about it it's bad enough with an adult yeah but with a child the emotional effect on the families the parents the grandparents everybody involved from experience i can tell you the emotional effect that it has on emergency services is colossal okay one of my close friends was hit by a drunk driver and unfortunately she passed away obviously it's completely different situations i'm not going around drinking and driving but it's similar my actions can lead could lead to a death and after seeing what her family went through and what i meant there as a close friend of her i wouldn't wish that upon anybody if we move over to your vehicle now at 50 miles an hour the chances are you may have survived this collision okay but you may well have been seriously injured the issue with this is the police arrive and they see you and one of the first things they're going to do is have you got a mobile phone and they're going to take it off you because they think you may have been texting or distracted by your mobile phone okay if they think that then there's a very strong possibility you would be arrested for death by dangerous driving oh my goodness i really i regret the way that i have been driving and like i've been fortunate enough to not have any serious accidents or hurt anybody yet but like i said yeah i completely regret the way that i have been driving so did laura and jason's experiences help them overcome their bad driving habits i do feel i'm a better driver i'm maintaining 30 miles an hour i'm certainly more cautious and more aware of what's going on around me quite hard for you to have both hands on the wheel and it has calmed me down as well it's novel to see you driving so gently i think david's a lot more relaxed now normally belt down here and it had to be bouncing off the roof when he's approaching the roundabout he's slowing down at the roundabout rather than just keeping the speed up and i'm not feeling like i need to be gripping the dashboard or hanging onto the seat i do like the way you take the round bags now they still don't get my face squashed up against the glass and the same with the the traffic lights you know is definitely a noticeable difference now these are the traffic lights that i've had an issue with a couple of times and that was okay no no i wouldn't run a red light no yeah it's a lot nicer experience in the car now for laura the experience had an equally big impact laura is driving a lot more confidently she's not irresponsible anymore she doesn't pick up the phone she's very very good i feel a lot safer and i think it's nice when you do keep back hands on the steering wheel the things that i was doing are just ridiculous like text messages can wait phone calls can wait but lives can't i see so many people on their phone and i just look at them now and i'm like get off your phone i can go to bed without even worrying or waiting up for you to come home i know it's silly at your age but i don't think that anybody who's got children never stops worrying about them really really happy i feel everybody who's learning to drive and on the road should go through a similar process from the start and i think it would certainly save a lot of lives you\n"