Future Shock for Drunk Drivers Marks a New Age for Drivers

Attitudes about drinking and driving changed dramatically in the 1990s. At the beginning of that decade, nearly 20,000 people died every year because of drunk drivers. By the end of that decade, the number was down to 13,000. What made it all happen were the new DWI laws. Drunks lose licenses. So when you’ve had a few, give up your keys. It’s gotten into the culture.

For the past five years, however, the decline stopped. 2005s total was just about the same as it was in 2000. And so people in government are trying to come up with more creative ways to save lives. Their first success was something called an ignition interlock.

This device is a sort of collar affair that fits over an ignition key lock that will only allow the driver to turn a key in the ignition if he can pass a Breathalyzer test built into the device itself. It’s been in use now for two years. Blow into a tiny tube, and if your alcohol level is under the legal limit, the ignition key can be turned. If you fail, it can’t be budged. So you stay where you are.

In nearly all states in the union, a new law says that people who get convicted of a second DWI violation are required to use the ignition interlock, which can be installed by any car dealer. The restriction is clearly marked in big letters on the offender’s driver’s license, so if a police officer stops a driver who doesn’t have the ignition device that his license says he is supposed to have, he can lose his license and have his car impounded. Of course, none of this would prevent a drunk from getting a friend who is sober to blow into the tube so the car can be driven, even by the drunk. You can’t have everything. Or can you? Maybe science can even fix THAT workaround.

And so scientists and lawmakers are once again on the case. In New Mexico, lawmakers have passed a new law that says just ONE DWI requires you to have the ignition device. More states are shortly going to follow.

And scientists in Sweden, working at Saab, are now working on a way to disable a car WITHOUT having anybody blow into a tube. It involves shining a tiny light on the forehead of a person who sits in the driver’s seat. Somehow, the quality of the reflected light back tells you whether alcohol is involved. And it cannot be defeated. Pull your hat down and your car won’t start because it can’t get a reading. And so forth and so on. Another group of scientists are working on alcohol readings that can be discerned by touch. Put your hand on the steering wheel and it gives a reading. These things should be on the market within three years.

It’s amazing what electronic devices can be installed into a car these days. Maybe the next thing they can do for drunks is to brew up a cup of black coffee. Fail the DWI test, and a cup pops down into a cup holder and fills up with joe. You drink it down, and in thirty minutes you can try to pass the DWI censor again.

And then I think we can go try to tackle the motorist flatulence problem. Build these sniffers into the car seats. They already have the heated seat problem figured out. Put in sniffers, too, so when someone fires off a big one, they get ejected, straight up five hundred feet to be parachuted back down. Or better yet, flatulence is detected and all windows and doors open and everybody is automatically ejected from the vehicle, except for the flatulator. He gets to sit there, in whatever seat he is occupying, soaking up all the odors, while the car, now on cruise control, goes rolling along, doors banging, while all motorists coming the other way laugh and point at him.

And so, everybody’s car gets equipped with the automatic “flat eject” trigger. It’s standard equipment. Right next to the sideview mirror wigglers (you choose which ones and how much) and between the slap-you-sober button and the fast food trans-fat detector.