Street Smart: A new way of looking at an old problem Published Oct. 1, 2013 By Airman 1st Class Jonathan Bass 20th Fighter Wing Public Affairs SHAW AIR FORCE BASE, S.C. -- I'll be honest. When I learned that I had to attend a mass briefing on the morning of our most recent Comprehensive Airmen Fitness day, I was not excited. Cram way too many Airmen into the base theater and give us the same PowerPoint safety brief that my father received twenty years ago in the Marine Corps? No, thank you. However, I was wrong. Instead of the normal, dull droning on of some person from the safety office, there were two firefighter/paramedics from Miami, Fla., Ralph and Oscar. They gave a graphic presentation called Street Smart, which gave an honestly horrific view of driving distracted, under the influence, or without a seatbelt. I wear my seatbelt religiously; it's been programmed into my brain ever since I was a little kid riding in the back of the car with my parents. So automatically I wanted to turn my brain off when they started to talk about driving without a seatbelt. I do have a problem with texting and driving though. I know it's dumb, and dangerous; and previous to this brief, I thought I had heard all that could be said about the subject. I'm glad I didn't turn my brain off though, because what was shared deeply affected me. Ralph and Oscar shared from their personal experiences dealing with traumatic injuries from auto accidents. They included pictures of victims who didn't survive their crashes, and the detail was very real. Ralph and Oscar talked about what actually happens to the body when inertia takes over during an accident. If you're lucky, you have front impact air bags, which are standard in modern cars, but protect you only when used as a supplemental restraint. Without your seatbelt, an air bag is just that, a bag of air. During an accident, physics take over; an object in motion stays in motion until acted upon by another equal and opposite force. When your car slams into a pole at 55 miles an hour, your body is effectively moving at that same speed. Without your seatbelt, your body is now moving forward at that speed unrestrained. This happens and then the body can only take so much. Your chest slams into the steering column, breaking ribs, collapsing a lung and causing internal bleeding; your face goes into the windshield, smashing your nose and shredding the skin on your face. If you're lucky, you go through the windshield and hit the ground, only breaking bones and ripping skin off your arms and legs, those that aren't that lucky go up into the windshield after colliding into it and basically decapitate themselves. If you are able to survive all of that, now follows the best part. The first responders will have to do everything they can to ensure your survival. Without any pain medication they will have to push a large needle into your chest for that collapsed lung, stabilize your neck and head with a collar, set any obvious broken bones and get you on the stretcher. I'll skip all the surgeries, needles the length and width of a human arm bone, invasive and frankly embarrassing procedures to check if you're paralyzed and get to the point; what happens after you survive that crash. As a single Airman, my beneficiaries are my parents. If something were to happen to me, they would be the ones left with taking care of me. My 55-year-old parents, would have to change their 24-year-old son's diaper, all because I decided to not put my seatbelt on, or because I wanted to reply to that text, or because I chose to drive impaired. Ultimately it would be because I chose not to exemplify the Air Force's core values: integrity first, service before self, and excellence in all we do. As Airmen, we have sworn to uphold those core values. Our lives and the lives of others hang on our decisions that either support or deter from them. After seeing Street Smart, hopefully someone won't make the wrong decisions next time they drive.