Sad lesson: Hang up and drive

Perhaps the sobering particulars of an Orange County mother's death will give Triangle drivers the resolve we need to hang up our phones.

Witnesses saw Erin Lindsay-Calkins using her mobile phone as she crashed through a rail crossing gate in Efland and stopped her car in front of a fast-moving train. A camera mounted in the locomotive recorded images of the young driver holding her right hand to her ear.

Lindsay-Calkins, 26, died with her 5-year-old son, Nicholas, in the crash Dec. 22.

It's uncommon to find such detailed proof of cell-phone use contributing to a tragedy on the highway. Safety experts say the distractions of talking and texting often impair drivers as much as alcohol does, but crash reports rarely say whether phones were involved.

Ann T. Roberts of Durham won't forget the image of another driver with a phone to her ear. It was a woman chatting happily as she drove down U.S. 15-501 between Durham and Chapel Hill.

Roberts got a good, long look in her rear-view mirror -- in the agonizing moments before the woman rear-ended her car at a stoplight.

"She just kept on coming, and she wasn't paying attention," said Roberts, 44. "I couldn't move forward. She plowed right into us."

Roberts was two months pregnant at the time. The crash left her and her 7-year-old son with minor injuries. Her doctors said the impact contributed to complications with her pregnancy.

"This pregnancy was a big deal to me, and this scared me to death," Roberts said. After seven months of worry, she delivered a healthy baby girl.

Roberts describes the crash today as if it happened last week, but her daughter is 10 now.

"Now, every time I see somebody driving on the phone, it just makes me cringe," Roberts said. "You really need two hands on the wheel. I wouldn't want anybody to do that while they're driving, especially for just a casual conversation."

Test your memory

If you've used your phone behind the wheel -- and researchers say about 60 percent of North Carolina drivers have -- you should know how easily a conversation can take your attention from the road.

Jim Charbonneau of Wake Forest says you can prove this with a simple test: After you hang up, just try to recall what occurred on the road around you while you were on the phone.

"Unless something dramatic happened," he says, "everything else will be a blank."

Charbonneau uses a hands-free Bluetooth phone to avoid fumbling around the car for a little phone. But he says every phone chat still leaves him with that blank recollection.

I've had that blank experience in my car, and it gives me a shiver every time.

The phone rings, and I answer it. The traffic around me swirls into a dreamy background while I engage in a conversation that really could have waited a few minutes. Then I hang up and feel disoriented - and foolish.

I know it's time for me to hang up and drive.

As part of my resolution to be a better driver in 2010, I've recorded a new greeting for my mobile phone:

"I can't take your call while I'm driving my car - it's just too dangerous. So leave me a message, and I'll call you back as soon as I can."

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