If you are thinking of drink driving this xmas....................

[Lady Whistledown]

Another issue people forget about drug driving - Now i reckon there must be thousands driving round after having teh odd spliff - this lot should be sorted out too.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Does or has anyone ever come up with a calculation for how long alcohol stays in your system? So if, for example, I had six pints on a Saturday night, stopping at 11pm, when would be a safe time to drive on a Sunday? This will be a big issue for many over this festive period, methinks.

No, for the simple reason that it varies from person to person, from day to day.

There are plenty of factors that can influence the way in which your body processes alcohol through the system- your age, build, quantity of drink, type of drink, general health, food consumed, medication, tiredness and so on. Therefore you could not stand up one day and say with any confidence that three pints would leave you under the limit, because it might be very different on another day.

 

[Garage_Doors]

Does or has anyone ever come up with a calculation for how long alcohol stays in your system? So if, for example, I had six pints on a Saturday night, stopping at 11pm, when would be a safe time to drive on a Sunday? This will be a big issue for many over this festive period, methinks.

Too many factors to calculate. size, weight of person, tolerance to Alcohol, Strength of alcohol in the six pints, what and how much you have eaten, etc etc

 

[Acker79]

Or even drive

Quite. Curses. Too late to go back and edit.

 

[The Wookiee]

Does or has anyone ever come up with a calculation for how long alcohol stays in your system? So if, for example, I had six pints on a Saturday night, stopping at 11pm, when would be a safe time to drive on a Sunday? This will be a big issue for many over this festive period, methinks.

This is the point I was making earlier, nobody knows if they are over the limit or not.

I may get shot for this, but I speak from experience as I was banned for being over the limit the following morning. I felt fine, had a good nights sleep. Woke up at 7.30 had breakfast and drove to work.

I did not intentially drive knowing I was over the limit, I have never got behind the wheel after leaving the pub. I bet most people have at some pont done the same.

I now never drive until after lunch, if I have been out the night before.

 

[BensGrandad]

This is the point I was making earlier, nobody knows if they are over the limit or not.

I may get shot for this, but I speak from experience as I was banned for being over the limit the following morning. I felt fine, had a good nights sleep. Woke up at 7.30 had breakfast and drove to work.

I did not intentially drive knowing I was over the limit, I have never got behind the wheel after leaving the pub. I bet most people have at some pont done the same.

I now never drive until after lunch, if I have been out the night before.

This was my origional point if you steal or hit someone you know you have done it, but DD you possibly dont until it is too late. I am sure that there must be a way in which with modern science they could make a home breatherlyser that a person could take and is full proof and admissable as evidence that you took a test before driving to work and it showed that you were ok. If it showed that you failed then obviously you dont drive or face the consequences.

The problem is that I could get Ben to take the breatherlyser for me but I am sure there must be a way in which they could ascertain who actually breathed into the machine with perhaps a camera and photo attachment at the time of blowing which could be timed to the second. They can photoigraph drivers with no seat belts etc so why not this with the alcometer and photo working in sycronisation with each other.

 

[Acker79]

This was my origional point if you steal or hit someone you know you have done it, but DD you possibly dont until it is too late. I am sure that there must be a way in which with modern science they could make a home breatherlyser that a person could take and is full proof and admissable as evidence that you took a test before driving to work and it showed that you were ok. If it showed that you failed then obviously you dont drive or face the consequences.

Such a thing exists. They were in a vending machine in the toilets of a club I went to in Lapland.


I'm a little sceptical of the "I didn't know I was over the limit" excuse, simply because it's the morning after. There are plenty of people who don't know they are over the limit on the night they drink, because they only had one or two drinks.

Not every drink driver is paralytic. I'd suggest the majority were the sort who had one or two drinks and felt fine.

 

[BensGrandad]

This again was my point in the fact that some people, my sons included, have 1 pint of lager then drink coke all night if driving or vice versa drink coke all night then have 1 pint at the end of the night why have that 1 pint?

 

[BensGrandad]

Such a thing exists. They were in a vending machine in the toilets of a club I went to in Lapland.

Are they full proof and acceptable as evidence that you were ok to drive.

 

[Kuipers Supporters Club]

I recently had to go to a 'Safe Drive Stay Alive' event where a mother of two lost both her children in separate accidents talked to us (group of 200ish) and a disabled boy who was put into his current state via a friends driving. Fire-fighters, police and paramedics also talked to us, and told us their stories of having to tell family members. One who died from a drink driver (she was a passenger) on her 18th birthday.
That Mother talking and those images will live with me forever.
Truly Awful. But that's how to get the message across. The video above was shown.

 

[Acker79]

Are they full proof and acceptable as evidence that you were ok to drive.

I'm not sure if they are fool proof or acceptable in law, but it is something that could at least give an indication to someone who thought they were ok that they weren't (I seem to remember it was a red, amber green, thing and the guys that tried them (for a laugh, none of us had a car there) they were surprised at how high it was because they had only had a couple of drinks during the day.

 

[Easy 10]

Therefore you could not stand up one day

I would generally take this as a good indicator that I am probably over the limit.

 

[Tim Over Whelmed]

The problem is the misinformation, I hear people quote that it only takes one hour for 2 units of alcohol to pass through your system (i.e. to leave your blood stream not to have a piss!) ... which I am reliably lead to believe is very much not the case and there isn't a simple calculation of two pints taking twice as long etc. The message has to be no drinking and driving and that means the day after. So if you are driving the next day it should be YOUR responsibility to ensure you are at 0g (or whatever the biological equivalent of no alcohol is)

 

[stss30]

In other countries, there is no drink drive limit... scary

 

[Jimbo.GRFC]

Dare I suggest that as part of the driving test here in the UK, that video or one that we create ourselves with the same impact, should be mandatory and shown as part of the test. I seem to recall that in Victoria they always used to operate what they called booze buses, stopping drivers at various points. To end though quite possibly the most hard hitting video on this subject that I have ever seen and would be interested in the stats from their campaign.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Not every drink driver is paralytic. I'd suggest the majority were the sort who had one or two drinks and felt fine.

Most aren't paralytic, far from it. Although most have had more than two drinks: they tend to stick with the story of "only a couple" because they hope it will get them a better deal in court. I've dealt with alcoholics who outwardly appeared in a reasonable state (because their bodies are used to processing vast amounts of alcohol they display fewer of the symptoms of drunkenness, although their reflexes and speed of thought are still very impaired). Yet these people are often four or five times over the limit.

While some of the people who looked utterly RUINED were only a little way over.

Goes to show you can never tell how it will affect you.

 

[Jimbo.GRFC]

Guys, I'm going to put my cards on the table here, 15 years ago I was caught drink driving. To this day I hang my head in shame...3 year ban but more importantly I thank the lord above that I didn't harm/kill anyone. Its a part of my life I will take to my grave, if you ever think of doing it, please don't. That my friends has taken some inside hurt to confess...

 

[Notters]

This was my origional point if you steal or hit someone you know you have done it, but DD you possibly dont until it is too late. I am sure that there must be a way in which with modern science they could make a home breatherlyser that a person could take and is full proof and admissable as evidence that you took a test before driving to work and it showed that you were ok. If it showed that you failed then obviously you dont drive or face the consequences.

I have a digital one that I bought on Amazon. It is SUPPOSED to be accurate, but I tried it 10 minutes after finishing off four pints and it said I was well under the legal limit; so it's gone on the scrap heap.

 

[HastingsSeagull]

Quality video, they always do these and not sure how much they actually work but even if it stops just one moron drink driving it's a good thing

 

[Notters]

In other countries, there is no drink drive limit... scary

Indeed! Can't be long till we adopt the same as the most of western Europe but IMO we've got it spot on as it is.