If there is one topic that has come up consistently through a decade of Bobby Nitro, in so many conversations with petrolkoppe from the drags to drifting to show ‘n shiners, is the topic of safety.
Bobby remembers talking with the Killarney guys behind Street 2 Strip, and they were talking about the necessity to get the go fast crowd off the streets, and onto the regular meets at the raceway.
The modkoppe would speak about the need to up your brakes if you were considering that turbo, and the display crews made the move to air to get away from what can be dodgy drop strategies.
The gedagte that emerges from all these conversations is that it is each person’s responsibility to take responsibility for their game, to pay attention to what is safe and what is not, on the roads.
So Bobby decided to look into this road safety thing, armed with the information that about 17 000 people die on South African roads every year, including 3 000 children.
Just this year, over 300 people have been killed on Western Cape roads. There is a huge cost to that, for families in losing loved ones and breadwinners, and for all South Africans.
So what can we as petrolkoppe do about it? After all, we do set the trend. Accidents tend to happen suddenly, if you’ve ever been in one, you’ll know you hardly see it coming.
Well, there’s a clue right there. What if we started to pay more attention to being seen on the roads? Bobby is not talking about “being seen” in the latest M4 here, he’s talking about visibility.
Visibility means paying attention to making sure you can see what is around you at all times, and knowing that there are certain times of the day when it is more difficult to see things, namely dusk and dawn. Apparently, a full 20 percent of accidents happen around sunset.
There’s a good start to a big issue. If we can be more careful around sunset, knowing it’s hard to see pedestrians for instance, we can make a plan, such as slowing down, leaving more reaction distance, turning headlights on before the light fades and keeping all mirrors clean and in good order, we can make a small change.