(Spirit Lake)– While it’s the law for drivers and the front seat passenger to be buckled up, that is NOT the case for passengers in the rear seats. Kevin Krull, a trooper with the post six office of the Iowa State Patrol in Spencer tells KUOO news it’s just as important for them to be buckled up as well in the event of a crash. He points out recent statistics from the Governor’s Traffic Safety Bureau…
“They found that only 67 percent of the people admit to wearing it all the time in the back seat. The safety factor is the same whether you’re in the front seat or the back seat in these crashes. The dangers are still there. When we look at if we have a 90 plus percent compliancy rating with people wearing their seatbelt normally, we still have 44 percent of our people dying on the roadways that are not wearing their seatbelt. That’s 108 people. With that being said, we’re asking people to go above and beyond, not just rely on the law but let’s do the safe thing and let’s buckle up all the time wherever we’re at in the vehicle because we want everyone to be safe.”
Krull says they’ll be driving home the importance of seatbelt use through a special enforcement campaign in the Iowa Great Lakes that started Monday and continues through June 1st. It’s been dubbed “Click it, Don’t Risk it”…
“And as a special part of that project for the local law enforcement we’re going to be partnering up with local lakes area officers and doing this campaign, being out there specifically looking for the seatbelt violations as well as our OWIs and distracted driving and the speed violations as well.”
Krull says their ultimate goal is this…
“We’re looking to get zero fatalities on the roadways which is a very lofty number, but the short term goal is to get to under 300 fatalities this year. That’s an attainable number. We’ve had some pretty bad years out there so we’re looking to step it in the right direction and make sure everybody is safe.”
Krull adds that 44 percent of traffic fatalities in Iowa last year consisted of those who were not buckled up.
