A lot of accidents on the road happened because drivers are in a hurry, distracted or simply intentionally do not follow the rules and regulations. Every year, about 421,000 people are injured in crashes that have involved a driver who was distracted in some way.
Week three of the checkstops – which run until the end of the month, New Year’s Eve included – saw around 4,000 vehicles stopped at 68 checkstops across the province.
RCMP charged 21 people with impaired driving and two with refusing a breath test.
The third week of the program also saw six alcohol-related suspensions, one drug-related suspension, and 12 people charged with improper storage of alcohol or cannabis in a vehicle. The Festive Checkstop Program runs over the entire month of December, including New Year’s Eve. Drivers can expect to see more police on the streets.
Unfortunately, a lot of those drivers are teenagers, who are not just irresponsible to their own vehicles and lives, but to other people’s health and lives as well. Some drivers just really don’t care about the rules and driving regulations, they do not care for their own safety and their passengers, friends and family members.
Last weekend in Winnipeg launched a new program to identify drivers who use cannabis or cocaine, using modern detectors Drager DrugTest 5000. In the process of preparation, the police service has acquired - and is currently engaged in training officers - new mobile devices for drug screening.
According to the information on the manufacturer’s website, Drager DrugTest 5000 uses oral fluid to test seven types of the most commonly used drugs. The police will use it to test for cannabis and cocaine.
Drager uses a swab moistened in the mouth to analyze substances on the spot, offering an alternative to collecting urine or blood samples, according to the instrument manual.
The police service bought seven such testers for $ 5000 each and brought them to the provinces on Saturday, December 1st. They will be used along with standard breath testers to determine alcohol. In addition, the police will use other drug screening equipment as additional tools to identify drivers affected by cannabis or cocaine.
The program will work every day throughout December. So fellow Winnipeggers please don’t text and drive, keep our roads safe and easy to drive. Let’s all be responsible drivers and care for each other, so at the end of the day, we can all come back home to our loved ones.