BROKEN BOW – From May 15 to June 4, the Custer County Sheriff’s Office will be participating in the “Click It or Ticket” campaign in partnership with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
During the campaign, the Sheriff’s Office will be working with other law enforcement officers across local and state lines to ensure that drivers and passengers stay informed regarding the necessity of seatbelt usage and the dangers of failing to do so.
“Buckling up is the simplest thing you can do to limit injury or save your life during a crash,” says Custer County Sheriff Dan Osmond. “We see the results of not wearing a seatbelt all the time. We see the loss of life, and so often, it could have been prevented.”
The national seatbelt use rate last year, according to the Sheriff’s Office, was 91.6%, though among young adults ages 18 to 34 killed while riding in passenger vehicles, 59% were completely unrestrained: one of the highest percentages of all age groups.
A common misconception about vehicle safety, the Sheriff’s Office says, is that pickup trucks are innately safer than smaller passenger cars due to their size. Unfortunately, the truth is that pickup trucks are just as dangerous as their smaller counterparts, if not more so: 61% of pickup truck occupants killed in crashes in 2021 were unbuckled, as opposed to 47% of unbuckled car occupants.
More information about the campaign can be found on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s website.
