BOISE, Idaho — Memorial Day marks the unofficial start of summer as students leave school and the weather begins to warm up; however, it's also the start of the most dangerous driving season, according to numbers from AAA Idaho.
This is a national problem and its earned the time period between Memorial Day and Labor Day the title of '100 Deadliest Days.'
In Idaho specifically, 40% of teen-related driving deaths are during these 100 days. Idaho is ranked 6th in the nation in 2020 for most teen-driver related deaths per capita.
In total, 26 people died in 2020 - 11 of them during the 100 deadliest days - from teen crashes
Idaho trailed only Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, Arkansas, and South Carolina, according to AAA Idaho.
The number of deaths in 2020 caught AAA Idaho spokesperson Matthew Conde off-guard. In 2019, 14 deaths resulted from teen crashes. With fewer people on the road through COVID, fewer people should have gotten in deadly wrecks, according to Conde.
The opposite happened.
"Every year there is a new crop of teen drivers. But during the pandemic it was so hard to get them to the drive schools. A lot of places didn't know how to do that. Do you have plexiglass? Does everybody wear a mask? In the early days, nobody knew what to do so those services just weren't available," Conde said. "You had a really strong batch of kids that were well intentioned, but just didn't have the foundational opportunity that some of their predecessors had."
In Idaho, a person does not need to attend a driver’s education course in order to receive a drivers license once they turn 17 years old. Through COVID, it was common for new drivers to skip drivers ed and wait until their 17th birthday, according to Rocky Road Driving School Officer Manager Allison Tilden.
"I'm finding now I'm getting a lot more adults - at least one a week - who are parents. They are calling and saying, 'My kid is 17, 18, 19 years old. We opted not to do Drivers Ed. We are now figuring out we need driving lessons,'" Tilden said.
Before COVID, remedial students were rare, according to Tilden. Rocky Road usually taught no more than one a month.
"You had a really strong batch of kids that were well intentioned, but just didn't have the foundational opportunity that some of their predecessors had," Conde said.
These remedial students often don't know how to maneuver multi-lane round-abouts, merge onto an interstate, or yield to U-turns, Tilden said.
"That can make it really dangerous for a lot of people on the road," Tilden said.
AAA Idaho asks all drivers to revert to the fundamentals of defensive driving.
"Parents need to make sure that their teen drivers get quality instruction and plenty of experience behind the wheel, but they also need to set a good example," Conde said. "A 'do as I say, not as I do' approach teaches your child that becoming a seasoned driver offers the privilege of engaging in risky behavior. That belief can have tragic consequences."
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