What Affects Ability to Drive Other Than Alcohol?

Factual Questions
1

Night before last for one reason or another i managed to miss an entire night’s sleep. So i was driving home from work the following day making quite a few stupid driver errors and i started thinking about my state of obviously reduced concentration (probably should have focussed on the road instead but never mind). It made me think of a few questions.

Oh, in case it’s different where you live, in the UK it’s illegal to drive after having more than a couple of drinks (obviously more scientifically measured by saturated blood alcohol, but you get the idea). It’s measured purely by a little machine thing, UK cops don’t do any of that walk the straight line, tickle your belly and scratch your head type stuff i see on US Cop Shows. Anyway…

Assuming you do nothing else wrong, i.e. you haven’t been drinking and there is no grounds for a reckless driving charge or anything like that, can you be charged for driving whilst not in a fit state to drive?

I’m thinking my tiredness would be impossible to measure/prove therefore thats unlikely to work but it does seem to me that i probably shouldn’t have been driving. And those cough medicines that say ‘do not drive’, if you do could you be charged? How would anyone know?

What about if you’ve hurt your wrist so maybe couldn’t stear as well in an emergency, or hurt your ankle and maybe can’t hit the brake hard enough etc?

Lets go the other way and say you were in an accident, if it could be shown that your driving was likely to have been affected by tiredness, non-non-drowsy medicines, injury etc, could you be in trouble because of it?

2

A few years ago a university in Australia compared the driving ability of people suffering from colds/flu with those of drivers just over the legal limit. The sick drivers performed far worse.

I think in Australia it would be pretty easy to charge someone with not being in proper control of their vehicle if they were in any way visibly incapacitated. Here is an example of current thinking.

3

Being female.

(d&r)

4

[QUOTE=rocksolid]
Assuming you do nothing else wrong, i.e. you haven’t been drinking and there is no grounds for a reckless driving charge or anything like that, can you be charged for driving whilst not in a fit state to drive?
[/QUOTE]

Even if you have been doing something else wrong (i.e. illegal drugs), it’s difficult to pin a subjective judgement like that on someone. I don’t know anything about UK law, but in the US it is against the law to drive under the influence of illegal narcotics, but there is no roadside test that can accurately determine such a person’s present condition. So they will generally just try to find the narcotics and arrest the person for posession instead.

In the case of being “too tired” to drive, it’s obviously even more difficult to determine (read: impossible) and thus would be tricky to enforce effectively. Again, I know nothing about UK law, and a limited amount about US law.

5

[QUOTE=rocksolid]
Night before last for one reason or another i managed to miss an entire night’s sleep. So i was driving home from work the following day making quite a few stupid driver errors and i started thinking about my state of obviously reduced concentration (probably should have focussed on the road instead but never mind). It made me think of a few questions.

Oh, in case it’s different where you live, in the UK it’s illegal to drive after having more than a couple of drinks (obviously more scientifically measured by saturated blood alcohol, but you get the idea). It’s measured purely by a little machine thing, UK cops don’t do any of that walk the straight line, tickle your belly and scratch your head type stuff i see on US Cop Shows. Anyway…

Assuming you do nothing else wrong, i.e. you haven’t been drinking and there is no grounds for a reckless driving charge or anything like that, can you be charged for driving whilst not in a fit state to drive?

I’m thinking my tiredness would be impossible to measure/prove therefore thats unlikely to work but it does seem to me that i probably shouldn’t have been driving. And those cough medicines that say ‘do not drive’, if you do could you be charged? How would anyone know?

What about if you’ve hurt your wrist so maybe couldn’t stear as well in an emergency, or hurt your ankle and maybe can’t hit the brake hard enough etc?

Lets go the other way and say you were in an accident, if it could be shown that your driving was likely to have been affected by tiredness, non-non-drowsy medicines, injury etc, could you be in trouble because of it?
[/QUOTE]

My friend, in the Chicago area, was pulled over after NO drinks, NO drugs, NO lack of sleep. I think she was just simply not concentrating. The cop made her blow the breathalyzer :o and it came up 100% clean. The cop said, “Well, you’re on something!” and proceeded to book her. My friend requested to be taken to the hospital for a blood test (which would have produced positive or negative for drugs) and the cop wouldn’t do it. Her license was suspended for 6 months, presumably because she was “impaired in some way.” So yes, they can do whatever the hell they want and you have little recourse.

6

[QUOTE=don’t ask]
A few years ago a university in Australia compared the driving ability of people suffering from colds/flu with those of drivers just over the legal limit. The sick drivers performed far worse.

I think in Australia it would be pretty easy to charge someone with not being in proper control of their vehicle if they were in any way visibly incapacitated. Here is an example of current thinking.
[/QUOTE]

Thanks for the link don’t ask. The paper seems to be a recommendation paper though, have the recommendations actually been made law there? Also, it doesn’t make any recommendation on the way ability is measured, in practice how do the cops tell if you are fit to drive or not?

7

[QUOTE=e-logic]
Being female.

(d&r)
[/QUOTE]

Yup, i was going to mention that in my OP so sure was I that someone would mention it :wink:

8

[QUOTE=Kalhoun]
My friend, in the Chicago area, was pulled over after NO drinks, NO drugs, NO lack of sleep. I think she was just simply not concentrating. The cop made her blow the breathalyzer :o and it came up 100% clean. The cop said, “Well, you’re on something!” and proceeded to book her. My friend requested to be taken to the hospital for a blood test (which would have produced positive or negative for drugs) and the cop wouldn’t do it. Her license was suspended for 6 months, presumably because she was “impaired in some way.” So yes, they can do whatever the hell they want and you have little recourse.
[/QUOTE]

Now that is incredible. I very much doubt that would fly in the UK. No evidence whatsover? So where you are you can be booked just cause a cop reckons you are unfit to drive? I mean, if you actually commit a road traffic offense fair enough, but was that the case here?

9

[QUOTE=rocksolid]
Now that is incredible. I very much doubt that would fly in the UK. No evidence whatsover? So where you are you can be booked just cause a cop reckons you are unfit to drive? I mean, if you actually commit a road traffic offense fair enough, but was that the case here?
[/QUOTE]

I’m sure she did something to attract his attention. She may have been digging through her purse and swerved, may have rolled a stop sign, etc. She did something, and I believe she was coming out of the bowling alley (the prime spot in town for DUIs). Her lawyer cost a fortune, talked a big game, and came up empty.

10

[QUOTE=Kalhoun]
I’m sure she did something to attract his attention. She may have been digging through her purse and swerved, may have rolled a stop sign, etc. She did something, and I believe she was coming out of the bowling alley (the prime spot in town for DUIs). Her lawyer cost a fortune, talked a big game, and came up empty.
[/QUOTE]

Had she had any prior DUI conviction or something? If everyone faced a susspension for being too dumb to drive (even if for only a short period of stupidity) then I susspect most of us would be using public transport. I know I’ve made dumb decisions when driving several times, even though completely drug free it is easy to do. A good friend just a few days ago was driving with me, and steadily with perfect normality drove through a red light, certainly the lack of vehicles going the other way made it safe, but he just didn’t realise until about half way through the turn I said “you know you went through a red”.

11

If you are nicked for impaired driving, it will state the impairment as part of the charge.

So you get something like “Driving whilst impaired by alchohol” "etc

You could be impaired through legal or illegal drugs, both carry specific sanctions so even though your doctor prescribed treatment, it could render you unfit to drive.

Erratic driving would be used as evidence of being unfit to drive through lack if sleep, and this would be rather more serious than a careless driving charge.
The evidence would probably come from a mobile police video, some have been videod whilst nodding and struggling to stay awake.

Eyewitnessess could make up part of the evidence.In these days of mobile phones, its not unknown for concerned motorists to call into police with reports of dangerous driving, drunk driving extreme speeding etc.

If you were driving in such an erratic manner that police decided there was cause to stop you, then almost anything could be cited as an impairment, from using a mobile phone, to arguing with a passenger. reading a map whilst on the move and even if in the latter case you were driving safely, if the police can prove you were likely to be distracted and this would impair your ability to react in an emergancy, then you are toast.

This could even include extremely loud music.

I recall a fairly recent case where someone was charged because they had been eating an apple whilst they were driving, hit the papers as you’d expect.

12

Here is another Aussie link to drug related impairment sites, but it doesn’t seem that much has been done really.

13

[QUOTE=casdave]

I recall a fairly recent case where someone was charged because they had been eating an apple whilst they were driving, hit the papers as you’d expect.
[/QUOTE]

Personally I think that you should be doing nothing but driving when you drive (that’s not to say that I’m never guilty of doing similar things myself), so my reaction to the apple thing would be “bad luck, but fair enough.”

There have been studies done that have shown that a period of wakefulness of 17 hours results in an impairment equivalent to a 0.05% blood alcohol level. Here in Australia, fatigue can be a big problem as the distances between some towns are large and the roads are often straight and boring.

A 30min nap can help a lot but you need to be careful to allow yourself about 15mins to wake up properly.

On the topic of other things that may impair your driving, how about depression? Or high stress levels? Or anything else that will occupy your mind when it should be concentrating on the road.

14

A back-seat driver.

15

Being a general jerk will also affect your ability to drive.

If you are overly aggressive or high on testosterone, I bet you will more likely honk at others, drive too closely, speed, etc. At least, that is my experience as a cyclist on the road.

16

There has been some research on impairment testing, but I suspect that many in corporate and law enforcement are in love with the idea of drug testing and it’s propoganda value. Part of the problem with impairment testing, I think, is that they test only for impairment, not the cause. I don’t think we want to deal with lack of sleep, divorce, overeating, worry, or similar causes. Regardless of the fact that the end result is the same.
Are we ready to jail someone because she/he is too sleepy?
If there’s no market for test devices, it’s not likely that simple devices will be developed. But there are devices out there that apparantly work well and don’t require any bodily fluids or body parts.
Peace,
mangeorge

17

[QUOTE=Kalhoun]
My friend, in the Chicago area, was pulled over after NO drinks, NO drugs, NO lack of sleep. I think she was just simply not concentrating. The cop made her blow the breathalyzer :o and it came up 100% clean. The cop said, “Well, you’re on something!” and proceeded to book her. My friend requested to be taken to the hospital for a blood test (which would have produced positive or negative for drugs) and the cop wouldn’t do it. Her license was suspended for 6 months, presumably because she was “impaired in some way.” So yes, they can do whatever the hell they want and you have little recourse.
[/QUOTE]

You better give a cite or I’ll have to call bullshit. I’m not saying you are lying but I doubt you got the real story from your friend. There is no state in the country where you can be convicted of anything without evidence. No they can not do whatever the hell they want without recourse. In all states the legal limit for DUI is .08% BAC. In most that I know of you can also get a conviction at a lower limit if impairment can be proved (believe me an unexperienced drinker will be impaired at a lower level). In reality a prosecutor will not touch a case that is under the limit. It will be reduced to something like reckless driving. I have seen cases where the test came back as .07% BAC and the driver was on tape stumbling around obviously impaired. The prosecutor would not go forward with it. There is nothing stopping anyone from putting pen to paper and writing a ticket. It is a much different thing to get a conviction. Evidence of impairment must have been given. If no evidence was given there should have been an appeal.Maybe your friend was convicted of reckless driving (some states have high penalties for that especially for multiple offenses). Maybe your friend had a long horrible driving record which caused the long suspension. You can chose to not believe me but I guarantee your friend is keeping something from you.

18

[QUOTE=casdave]
If you are nicked for impaired driving, it will state the impairment as part of the charge.

So you get something like “Driving whilst impaired by alchohol” "etc

You could be impaired through legal or illegal drugs, both carry specific sanctions so even though your doctor prescribed treatment, it could render you unfit to drive.

Erratic driving would be used as evidence of being unfit to drive through lack if sleep, and this would be rather more serious than a careless driving charge.
The evidence would probably come from a mobile police video, some have been videod whilst nodding and struggling to stay awake.

Eyewitnessess could make up part of the evidence.In these days of mobile phones, its not unknown for concerned motorists to call into police with reports of dangerous driving, drunk driving extreme speeding etc.

If you were driving in such an erratic manner that police decided there was cause to stop you, then almost anything could be cited as an impairment, from using a mobile phone, to arguing with a passenger. reading a map whilst on the move and even if in the latter case you were driving safely, if the police can prove you were likely to be distracted and this would impair your ability to react in an emergancy, then you are toast.

This could even include extremely loud music.

I recall a fairly recent case where someone was charged because they had been eating an apple whilst they were driving, hit the papers as you’d expect.
[/QUOTE]

In New Jersey specifically the DUI law specifically states impaired due to alcohol or drugs. Here if you drive erractly because of reading a map or eating an apple it would be careless driving or if intent could be proved then it could be reckless driving. I believe that is the case in most or all of the states.

19

[QUOTE=Rigamarole]
Even if you have been doing something else wrong (i.e. illegal drugs), it’s difficult to pin a subjective judgement like that on someone. I don’t know anything about UK law, but in the US it is against the law to drive under the influence of illegal narcotics, but there is no roadside test that can accurately determine such a person’s present condition. So they will generally just try to find the narcotics and arrest the person for posession instead.

In the case of being “too tired” to drive, it’s obviously even more difficult to determine (read: impossible) and thus would be tricky to enforce effectively. Again, I know nothing about UK law, and a limited amount about US law.
[/QUOTE]

There is training for something called a Drug Recognition Expert. I’m not sure which states recognize a DRE as an expert. Here is the site of a lawyer I know which explains something of what a DRE does. Note that this is the site of a defense attorney, it is not a reference site.

20

Is that burden true solely for DUI, Loach? I know that, generally, if the cop says you were driving 80 in a posted 65 zone, you were. Even if you were going in the direction opposite to that of the cop. Cops are accepted as expert in estimating driving speed.
It’s been a long time since I’ve been ticketed, so things may have changed.