HUNDREDS of students witnessed the full horror of a road crash at a graphic demonstration yesterday organised as part of a new road safety initiative for third-level students.
The mock exercise staged at Mary Immaculate College in Limerick is aimed at reducing the number and severity of road traffic collisions and to improve road safety awareness.
Participants of the Lifesaver Project were also presented with hard-hitting road safety advertisements from around the world, personal accounts from people who have survived serious injury collisions and footage of the families of those who have died.
Emergency personnel also told more than 300 students of their own experiences at the scenes of accidents and also the follow-on effects and how it changes people’s lives forever.
All aspects of road safety were covered including, safety belts, drink and drug driving, speed, pedestrians and cyclists’ fatigue.
The multi-agency project is led by the Garda Síochána in association with the Limerick Ambulance Service, Limerick City and County Fire Service and it is supported by Limerick city and county councils.
Garda Tony Miniter of the Limerick Divisional Traffic Corps explained that the event was targeted at young drivers who were preparing to embark on their driving career.
He described the event as a very honest and hard-hitting account of the reality of road safety in Ireland as presented by emergency personnel who faced the horrors on the roads on a far too regular basis.
“The main aim of this project is to change people’s attitude towards road safety,” Garda Miniter said. “It is not about making people better drivers, it is about making them realise how easy it is for things to go wrong and the consequences of bad driving habits.
“These range from very bad cases of drink and drug driving to simply not looking at the road ahead.
“One life lost on our roads is one too many, one person injured on our roads is one too many. I believe that all of those who attended this event have left with their eyes truly opened to the reality of road safety in Ireland today,” he added.
Caroline Duffy, health and safety officer at Mary Immaculate College, said the Lifesaver Project was invited on campus to increase general road safety awareness, in an effort to promote good driving behaviour and to reduce the incidence of death and serious injury.