Many people’s days don’t end when the sun goes down. Since electricity went mainstream, people’s lives changed forever. Nowadays, many work well into the night, staying up late and otherwise continuing to live life regardless of the time of day.
Doing so means driving for most people. When the sun goes down, artificial lights rarely provide the same amount of lighting as it does. Since most accidents happen at night, it would probably benefit you to know a few safety tips for driving at night.
This information could save your life
The mechanics of driving remain the same day or night. However, things look different at night. Your often have limited ability to see everything around you. Keeping the following in mind could help you get to your destination safely:
- At night, it’s more difficult to judge distances, so leave yourself enough room and keep your eyes on the road. Not knowing how close you are to an object jeopardizes your reaction time.
- At night, you could easily misjudge your speed. This goes hand in hand with problems judging distance, since you may not realize that you often gauge your speed by the objects going by you, coming toward you and moving away from you.
- The headlights of an oncoming vehicle can interfere with your night vision, since the bright lights change your vision for at least 10 seconds. You could drive a substantial distance in that time.
- Seeing pedestrians becomes vastly more difficult at night. Even when people wear reflective clothing, their profiles are smaller than another vehicle, and when combined with the dark, you have limited ability to see them.
- Other drivers will have the same difficulties you do, and they could be even worse. Moreover, your odds of encountering a drunk or drowsy driver could increase at night.
- You probably wouldn’t consider driving without your headlights at night so you can see. However, your headlights serve another, vital purpose — to make you visible to others.
Other drivers may not keep this information in mind when driving at night. You could end up encountering such a driver as you travel Connecticut’s roadways. If a collision occurs, you may suffer serious injuries. As the medical expenses go up and your income goes down during your recovery, your thoughts may turn to whether you can recover some of those and other losses. It may be possible through the filing of a personal injury claim.
