Special 'Black Box' May Save Teen Drivers
L O S A N G E L E S, Sept. 16, 2002 -- Every time 17-year-old Ryan Evans gets in his car, he must insert a special key that identifies him as the driver and activates a black box under the front seat. The box is, basically, a computer that records every second of his driving.
He's one of eight teenage drivers who have been testing the black box for its manufacturer, Road Safety International, in Thousand Oaks, Calif.
"At first," says the teen, "I thought I didn't really need it and it would kind of be like on a burden on me. Because it just feels like my mom would be right next to me telling me what I'm doing wrong."
His mother and father like the idea of "going along for the ride," even if it is by proxy.
"I've always been concerned, as a parent, that when my son or my older son would take the car, you never had any idea what they are going to do," says his father, Mark Evans. "So the computer gave us an opportunity to know at all times if Ryan was behaving or misbehaving behind the wheel."
Alarms Point Out Driver’s Mistakes
The black box, called Safeforce, monitors five areas of concern, says Larry Selditz, CEO of Road Safety International. "It tells the parents whether the teen is wearing a seat belt, whether they're speeding, the engine RPM of the vehicle, whether they're hard cornering, hard braking."
Selditz has been selling black boxes for emergency vehicles, such as ambulances, for some time. He got the idea to market a simpler, cheaper version for teenage drivers when his own son turned 15.
"Teenagers are tremendously at risk and so that's where the idea started," says Selditz. He points out that statistics show teen drivers are more than twice as likely to die in car accidents than all other drivers.
In Thousand Oaks, where Ryan Evans lives, nine teenagers have been killed in car crashes in the last year.
The black box might have made a difference. It emits a series of increasingly loud alarms when a young driver makes an error.
During a recent drive with Ryan, the alarm went off several times: once when he turned too sharply, once when he braked hard after racing up to an intersection, and once when he drove slightly above the speed limit.
Not only is he aware of the infractions as they occur and can make the necessary corrections, but his parents can monitor his driving performance later by downloading the information from a memory card inside the black box.
Ryan says his driving has improved, but his friends want no part of this new technology. "My friends," he says, "totally don't want any of it. They always say, like, don't tell my parents."
A Father’s Grief
But parents have good reason to worry. The combination of inexperience and teenage bravado can be lethal.
Ken Fahr, a grieving father in Bedford, Ind., knows all about that. "I know my daughter will not be coming home," he says.
Kari Fahr, 16, died this summer when the car in which she was riding hit a tree at high speed.
Her father, a paramedic, was already familiar with the black box installed in many ambulances. He believes Kari would be alive today if the friend who was driving that night had had a black box in the car. In fact, he prays they will one day be standard equipment for teenage drivers.
"I don't wish any parent to experience what my wife and I are going through," Fahr says.
He says they had put in an order for a black box for their daughter's car before she was killed.
The device goes on sale nationwide in November for about $280.
Selditz, the Road Safety International CEO, says insurance companies may offer discounts for those teen drivers who have a black box. He suggests those discounts may earn back the cost of the device in a single year.