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Car Stunts: When Teens Try To Defy Death

By Jason Epstein

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 02Nov2010 Word count: 434 Viewed: 303 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

Blame YouTube. Blame the success of the "Jackass" TV series and films. Whatever the reason, teens are engaging in more and more overtly-dangerous car stunts - and racking up an alarming number of car accidents involving personal injury and wrongful death.

First the good news; according to researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (the CDC), fatal teen car accidents, overall, declined by 36% between 2004 and 2008. While car accidents resulting in wrongful death are still the leading cause of death for teens in the U.S., this remarkable drop shows that there is a great deal of progress in the campaign to safeguard the lives of America's youth on our roads.

But that campaign is far from over. First of all, teens, because they are relatively new drivers, are still four times as likely to die in car accidents as older drivers. When a growing penchant for dangerous car "stunt" driving is added to that lack of experience, the chance of death or injury mushrooms.

The three main types of dangerous teen driving behavior are:

Car Surfing - Riding on top of moving vehicles
Ghost Riding - Riding in a car without a driver
Skitching - Cars pulling a skateboarder behind them

The CDC reports that 58 people died in car-surfing accidents between 1990 and 2008 alone, with another 41 cases of personal injury. The toll from ghost riding and skitching has never been calculated; but the numbers from all these types of car accidents seem to be skyrocketing in recent months.

CBS News recently reported on this dangerous phenomenon that's leaving a trail of victims all across the country. In Kewaunee, Wisconsin, a teen ended up bleeding and unconscious after falling from the top of a car during a stunt in a parking lot last April. In New Castle, Pennsylvania, Natalie Huff was also injured after car surfing - she fell off the hood and was actually run over by the car. She was left with several broken ribs, a ruptured spleen and a broken pelvis, and legal charges are pending.

And in Ojai, California, Cody Doolittle was skitching, when he lost control of his skateboard while being pulled by a friend's SUV last August. The 18 year-old died in the hospital that very same day.

"It feels like I'm in a dream," said Craig Doolittle, the boy's father. "I can't believe this has happened."

The probability of wrongful death and personal injury from these kinds of car accidents is high. "An injury even at those slow speeds can result in significant neurologic disability and even death," neurologist Dr. Alan R. Cohen commented to CBS News.

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