Enjoy your truck, but buckle up

Nothing symbolizes greater Nebraska and Kansas life than a pickup truck. Rolling down a dusty gravel road at sunset, a cow dog leaping from side to side in the back, the image of a light truck is as American as it gets. Even if it has a Japanese nameplate on the front.

Unfortunately, the rugged freedom that a truck represents is too often associated with fatal crashes on rural roads. Too often we hear of drivers and passengers killed after they are thrown free from the truck after it turns over in the ditch.

With Nebraska traffic fatalities at a four-year high, the problem is getting the attention of state officials, specifically Fred Zwonechek, state Highway Safety Administrator, who announced the "Buckle Up In Your Truck" campaign, starting this Sunday and running through May 13.

The state is launching an intensive seat-belt use media campaign aimed directly at pickup truck drivers and their passengers.

While wearing a seatbelt is always important, it's doubly so in a pickup truck. According to Laurie Klosterboer, the council's executive director, "pickup trucks are more likely to overturn in these crashes, and unbelted occupants are likely to be ejected from the vehicle, resulting in serious injuries or death. We have intensified efforts to educate motorists about the importance of seat belt use in a rollover crash."

"Pickup trucks are involved in nearly one third of all fatal crashes, yet pickup truck occupants have some of the lowest seat-belt use rates of any vehicle," Zwonechek said. "Of the 31 pickup truck drivers and passengers killed in Central Nebraska during the past three years, 26 were not wearing them," he said. "If we are going to have any success at preventing most of these tragic losses of life, we simply have to get more drivers and passengers to buckle up," Zwonechek added.

Nebraska is joining Iowa, Kansas and Missouri in the campaign, and the Nebraska State Patrol and local law enforcement agencies plan high-visibility traffic enforcement operations. In addition, the agencies will have the added emphasis of enforcing the state's child restraint and seat belt laws during the month of May.

Buckle up, and make sure your passengers and children do, too. That way, all of you can enjoy tomorrow's Nebraska sunset.