Driving While Smoking

[beso]

Why is it legal to smoke a cigarette while driving a car?

Cigarettes contain many toxic chemicals and the effects are quite dramatic. It isn't called "spin" for nothing.

Smoking requires one hand, which is one of the reasons mobile phones are not supposed to be used by drivers.

Smoking involves containing a small fire that could easily escape if the driver has to pay extra attention to the road at some point. I have seen drivers roll and light cigarettes while driving.

Cigarettes thrown form cars cause many roadside fires which sometimes expand to very large fires.

Has any research on the effect of smoking while driving ever been done or are the tobacco companies too powerful?

[tonyav]

Dunno annemollie, it's just what small kids usually keep asking when you are driving any distance going away on hols etc.

[EdgeofDarkness]

Beso, you must be young. Many pilots used to smoke, and that was in the days when planes didn't have computer systems doing all the flying for them. They're not allowed to now of course, because of a fashion over the last 30 years or so for people to try to interfere with other people's freedoms.

[ojread2]

It's illegal to smoke in a car with under 16's in in some parts of the world

I'm not particularly anti smoking, if you want to smoke I dont care if you kill yourself. I do care, however, if you decide to smoke so it goes into my lungs and the lungs of my children. For that not to happen you have to be quite a long way away from me, so do it where I can't smell it

Lighting a ciggie, peeling a banana, unwrapping a sweet, changing a CD all fall within the distracted whilst driving a lethal weapon category IMO and, as said above, can see you prosecuted for driving with undue care and attention

On the subject on Taxi/cab drivers their license means they are not allowed to and many have been fined already

[vulcan]

I have asked this before but nobody answered it so I will ask again on this thread.I took my driving test when cars didn't have indicators and hand signals were used, so I spent a lot of the time with an arm out of the window. I passed the test so obviously considered safe to drive even though I was driving with one hand, so why is it considered dangerous these days? Speed doesn't come into it as the test then, as now, is taken in a 30 mph area.

[paddywak]

Even when I used to smoke back in the sixties I never smoked in my or other peoples cars and I didn't allow smoking in my car. I don't really know why because it was before all this anti smoking, safety and health stuff I just didn't like smoking in my car.

[tonyav]

Good question, vulcan42.

[EdgeofDarkness]

Yes, oj, I should have added that you have to weigh the 'harm principle'. I'm no expert on law in general, but a lot of law in democratic states seems to be based on this principle - to restrict one person's action by law there has to be a weight of evidence that the action might harm other people. This is why there is now restriction on smoking in vehicles for public use. For the individual owner-driver, the harm principle does not apply, he is entitled to harm himself if he chooses. As for data gathering - the data is already there in accident reports. If there was a strong correlation between smoking and accidents, I'm sure we'd have been told about it.

[woofgang]

I tell you what i do hate though, and that's when the smoker slings the still lit fag end out of the open car window. Round here (New Forest) it has been known to start heath fires as well

[BlueToffee]

Far more accidents are caused by people either talking or texting on their mobiles, than smoking.

Agree, you do have to take your hand off the wheel to light and puff, but don't you also have to take your hand off the wheel to change gear?

And indeed, more accidents are also caused by drivers not putting their headlights on in adverse weather conditions rendering themselves invisible to other motorists.

[ojread2]

I'm sure we would have been - there are quite possibly studies out there already
I've seen aftermath of accidents caused by someone changing a CD - driver died, passenger had dreadful injuries
Peeling a banana - driver swiped car next to him cos he dropped the peel
Simply eat before you leave, or stop if you really need a cigarette, it's easy to do.
ATEOTD, if you have an accident on the motorway or a busy road cos you couldn't find your lighter, how many others are you going to injure or even kill?

[ojread2]

bluetoffe that's very true, but I drive an automatic :D

Seriously though, changing gear takes seconds and you are taught how to do that. You are never taught to light a cig or peel a banana, are you?

[piggynose]

what happened to common sense? sorry i forgot smokers dont have any.

[beso]

Tobacco is often called "spin" by cannabis smokers because that is what it does to the brain of those not accustomed to tobacco.

[beso]

BlueToffee //Far more accidents are caused by people either talking or texting on their mobiles, than smoking. //

Yes. That is why using a phone while driving is illegal unless it is a hands free setup. The key point is "hands free".

Cigarette smoking is not hands free.

[hc4361]

Dropping a lit cigarette can be hazardous.

http://www.thisislincolnshire.co.uk/Motorist-hit-parked-car-Boston-searching-dropped/story-16291284-detail/story.html

http://www.eveningexpress.co.uk/Article.aspx/1919861

As can throwing the butt out of the window
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1377826/Racehorses-die-cigarette-passing-car-starts-blaze-trailer.html

[hc4361]

People who smoke cigarettes do not get a head spin, beso. They are used to the nicotine.

[daffy654]

Cannabis smokers do not call it spin, I have spent most of my 44 years on this planet around weed smokers and have NEVER ONCE heard it called that.

[fourteen85]

For this very reason I learned to roll my cigs one handed

[PetitAnglais]

Smoking and indeed mobile phones etc are all covered by existing laws. There is a general statute that says a driver must be in control of the vehicle. The mobile phone laws are really pretty well unnecessary too, let's not compound it further by adding to the list of unncecessary specifics. If we list specifics then that is a very long list and ultimately futile.

[TWR]

A quick one to think about, if you have a passenger/ s that you always give a lift to & from work, could the claim off you for passive smoking?