Officials: ‘Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over’

Provided by PennDOT:

PennDOT and safety partners, the U.S. Coast Guard, the Philadelphia Police Department, the Pennsylvania State Police, the Pennsylvania DUI Association, the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital and AAA Mid-Atlantic, held a news conference earlier this week at the U.S. Coast Guard facility on Washington Avenue in Philadelphia, to kick off an Independence Day Impaired Driving Enforcement campaign.

Participants discussed regional DUI patrols for the national “Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over” campaign which runs through July 6. The Coast Guard and the Philadelphia Police Department Marine Unit also demonstrated a mock Boating under the Influence (BUI) stop.

According to 2013 Pennsylvania State Police data between July 3 and July 7, a total of 811 crashes were investigated. Sixty-seven of those crashes were alcohol-related, including four of the 11total fatalities. During the same period, state troopers arrested 411 people for driving under the influence.

The number of people killed increased over last year’s Independence Day holiday. Between July 4 and 8, 2013 there were nine fatalities and 312 injuries in the 845 crashes to which troopers responded. These reports cover only those incidents investigated by state police and do not include statistics on crashes to which other law-enforcement agencies responded.

The enforcement effort is supported by part of the $4 million in federal funds PennDOT distributes statewide, which come from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

To learn more about PennDOT’s efforts to prevent impaired driving or other safety initiatives, visit www.JustDrivePA.com.