A Reality Check: How Many of Us Actually Wear Seat Belts?

[vijay]

Made a recent trip to Chalala, near Amreli in saurashtra district in Gujarat whch is approx 300 kms one way as a family member passed away.So took the driver along with 600 kms plus journey in single day was hectic with this news.
He tried to take off the seatbelt giving me reason of no cops on this highway, made him very clear that either he keeps wearing the seat belt through out the journey till we reach back home town or he can leave driving and get back to his home i can drive by myself but not an inch without belt.
He gave weird frustration looks but kept on wearing it till we reached back home.

 

[bharathbigb]

Till about three months back, I did not pay any heed to seat belts. Sometimes for style maarna I wore them, but when I read about how much risk they reduce, I started wearing them. Heck, I even took out the hooks for rear seat belts which on demand were under the seat (They were a pain in the bum when sat on).
My car does not even have the seatbelt chime, neither are seat belts mandatory in my city. Wish they were:



Both of us are facing the same difficulty, friend

Same here.I and my Dad support our family to wear seat-belts but none except use wear them.Thank you

 

[DJ bro]

Made a recent trip to Chalala, near Amreli in saurashtra district in Gujarat whch is approx 300 kms one way as a family member passed away.So took the driver along with 600 kms plus journey in single day was hectic with this news.
He tried to take off the seatbelt giving me reason of no cops on this highway, made him very clear that either he keeps wearing the seat belt through out the journey till we reach back home town or he can leave driving and get back to his home i can drive by myself but not an inch without belt.
He gave weird frustration looks but kept on wearing it till we reached back home.

The problem is these people worry about cops checking instead of their own safety!
They must be educated about safety.

 

[bharathbigb]

The problem is these people worry about cops checking instead of their own safety!
They must be educated about safety.

Too damn true,My friend ! My Sister tells me the same."You see a cop,Wear the Belt ! When you escape one,Enjoy the Air" I told her "We need our lives to enjoy the Air and Belts will only keep us safe-What's the use of enjoying the air if there is no life in us" Thank you

 

[shrid]

We might be going off topic, but I know many people who think that Seat Belts do not lock. In their words: "The belt just comes forward with us, make it difficult to breath and gets us a fine. Besides, it even makes getting out a trouble."

And with a stand of "Break as much rules as possible! They are useless anyway!", the Anti-Seat belt team comes to bash up the rules.
I mean, there is no loss in buckling up, leave the clicking in and out. But who listens? I'm outta here.

 

[bharathbigb]

Don't worry Shrid,They will understand why real soon. 'It even makes getting out of trouble,harder' I mean,What in the hell was that ? These guys must defenitly experience a Crash.And these fools will understand.Thank you

 

[dhoom9]

I had faced twice fatal accidents, once in driver seat & once in co-passenger seat. Both time liver injury & saved after operation. What I can say is if would have wear seat belt mine injury would have been much less & if car would have been equipped with airbags (front in first & side / curtain in 2nd) I might would have been uninjured. So now I wear seat belt every time on highway & never start car on highway without it.

It is very dangerous not to wear seatbelt in car equipped with airbags. Many says airbags don't open if seatbelt is not fastened, but it is not so always. There had been incident where airbags had been inflated though seatbelt not fastened, & often front rib fractures occur when chest strikes with inflating airbags.

None of my driver like to wear seatbelt except cop prone area, then I wear seatbelt in rear seat & relax.

Only problem I had with seatbelt is I like to recline my rear seat & relax, & this position not much benefited by wearing seatbelt .

 

[dgogoi]

Three years back, I was on the way to MG Road, Bangalore in a cab and my cab met with an accident. I was the only passenger sitting on the rear passenger seat of the Indigo. There was a BMTC Volvo bus in front of us and traffic was slow. The Volvo started moving after a stop and our car was also accelerating. Suddenly the Volvo bus applied brake. Just at that moment, my driver was distracted for couple of seconds and when he looked front found that the bus has suddenly stopped and he could not apply the brake properly and banged the Volvo bus from behind at about 25 kmph speed. Though I wear seat belt most of the time, this cab did not have the buckle in position due to the seat cover, so I did not have the option to wear seat belt in the rear passenger seat. I had injury in my left eye as my head collided with the headrest of front-left seat. Initially I was not able to see properly, Manipal Hospital was just half kilometre behind and I immediately reached emergency ward of Manipal Hospital in an auto. While there was no internal/major injury, it took one week to get my injured eye back to normal. One of the eye specialists in the hospital said "you are lucky, people loose eye in such impact".

After this accident, I make sure that I wear seat belt each and every time. See the impact of an accident when the car was at slow speed of about 25 kmph, what would have happened had the accident happened in higher speeds, just scary.

I will also make sure that my next car is equipped with both ABS and Air Bags.

Regards,
-Dipendra

 

[nick1188]

Funny this post came up in my CP now..
Just today I had an incident..
I was driving around 30kmph speed and it was not on the main road.. There was a school boy coming from opposite side on a bicycle.. just when he was some 10 feet from my vehicle he suddenly took a U-turn in front of me and I had to apply sudden brakes.. I just stopped 1 feet or so from him.. and the reaction I get was the boy laughed at us and went on..(before anyone steps in let me just say he wasn't that young around 14yrs or so maybe).. I had my heart in mouth, really frustrating to see such ignorance ..

Also, a side story of it was I had the belts on and i got a minor jerk whereas my friend who didn't put the belts literally banged on the dashboard.. So seatbelts do help.. Though even after this incident, my friend didn't put on the seatbelts. I'm not sure what else would it take for him to start putting seatbelts

 

[Sidd7hartha]

This thread is for seat belt utility but I can not resist myself after reading the experience of 'nick1188' to comment on the behavior of cyclists on road. A month ago I was taking a U-turn after getting proper signal. A cyclist came rushing from opposite diagonally before me. The car speed was too low so I managed to stop a few inches before him. But the cyclist out of fear fell down. If I reacted a few seconds latter he would certainly get the hit and cycle will surely be damaged. No resistance came from anybody, but I parked the vehicle on other side of the road for a few minutes. The cyclist took away his cycle as if he had no fault.

 

[shrid]

Just felt like posting this here: Went for the test drive for Polo today. My father was driving, and the SA was there in the front seats. When I sat in the back, there was no seat belt hook! I told the SA and he changed places with me
Poor guy risked his life (Were driving on the NH-3 at ~120 km/h) for us. That is called loyalty!

 

[GrandRk]

Just felt like posting this here: Went for the test drive for Polo today. My father was driving, and the SA was there in the front seats. When I sat in the back, there was no seat belt hook! I told the SA and he changed places with me
Poor guy risked his life (Were driving on the NH-3 at ~120 km/h) for us. That is called loyalty!

Now this is something new for research. Does test drive cars are equipped with basic safety features?

 

[themusicessentials]

Yes I do wear seat belt, But i also think that Airbags should be provided in all the cars.

 

[vijay]

Just felt like posting this here: Went for the test drive for Polo today. My father was driving, and the SA was there in the front seats. When I sat in the back, there was no seat belt hook! I told the SA and he changed places with me
Poor guy risked his life (Were driving on the NH-3 at ~120 km/h) for us. That is called loyalty!

Its a shock first of all that no seat belt hookon the quality that germans say about? Or was it broken on this piece of vehicle.

 

[rajesh_nk22]

Nice to see option 1 leading the poll :)