Should DUI Alcohol Limit Be Lowered To 0.05 Percent?

The National Transportation Safety Board recommends reducing the limit. Some say it would save lives. Others say it's unreasonable.

One drink could be the standard for drunken driving – at least for some people if the National Transporation Safety Board has its way. On Tuesday, the NTSB recommended states lower the blood-alcohol threshold for driving under the influence from 0.08 percent to 0.05 percent. What do you think? Is the proposal reasonable? About 10,000 deaths a year are related to drunken driving. The NTSB says the lower limit would save 500 to 800 lives a year. Officials at the American Beverage Institute called the proposal "ludicrous." It said the average woman could reach the 0.05 percent limit by having one drink. There were 114 DUI fatalities in Massachusetts in 2012, which were 34 percent of traffic-related fatalities last year, according to Mothers …

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Roth Gill

5:50 pm on Friday, May 17, 2013

How about really, REALLY hard penalties for people caught driving under the influence and proper enforcement of those penalties? Lowering the standard from 0.08 to 0.05 is not going to stop or prevent any drunk driving accidents. The man from Billerica who was arrested over the weekend on his 12th DUI was FAR over either limit and already had his license revoked. HE SHOULD'VE BEEN IN JAIL WHERE …   more ›

Cops Crack Down on Drunk, Impaired Driving

Woburn Police warn drivers: "Drive sober, or get pulled over."

  Woburn Police is cracking down on impaired driving as part of a national campaign stretching into Labor Day. Woburn, along with 128 other Massachusetts departments, will conduct an "intensive crackdown on impaired driving" between Aug. 15 and Sept. 3 as part of the "Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over" campaign. Impaired driving includes operating a vehicle "under the influence of intoxicating liquor, or of marijuana, narcotic drugs, depressants or stimulant substances," according to Mass General Law. “Our message is simple and unwavering: if we find you driving impaired, we will arrest you. No exceptions,” said Police Lt. Chris Wackrow. According to police, impaired driving is one of the most committed and deadliest crimes. In 2010, there …

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Earnhardt

10:32 am on Saturday, August 18, 2012

Agreed Julie. If you notice, more of the "garden variety" are too busy talking on cellphones to pay attention to driving. It's not just drunks anymore.   more ›

Sobriety Checkpoint Held on New Year's Eve

State police will set up a routine sobriety checkpoint for drivers somewhere in Middlesex County this weekend.

If you spot a state trooper camped out by the side of the road somewhere in Middlesex County this weekend, he or she may be doing more than just watching for speedsters. State Police Superintendent Col. Marian McGovern announced last week that a sobriety checkpoint will be established on an undisclosed public way in Middlesex County from Saturday into Sunday—New Year's Eve into New Year's Day. The checkpoints, which are funded by a state grant, are routine operations performed by the state police. McGovern said in a press release that the purpose of the checkpoint is to further educate motorists and strengthen public awareness to the need of both detecting drivers who are operating under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol and taking …

IMAGE GALLERY: Driving Home the Point: Don't Drink and Drive

WMHS seniors and juniors watch police, fire, ambulance personnel respond to mock accident scene, along with a hearse.

She lay as though she had been thrown through the windshield onto the hood of a white car, now stained with her “blood.” For about 45 minutes, her right arm hung limply over the car’s passenger-side front wheel, out from under the white sheet that covered the rest of her body. Firefighters and ambulance personnel pulled “injured” students out of white and maroon cars involved in a staged drunk-driving accident outside the high school Thursday morning. Only after all the students who survived the mock accident were “treated” and some “transported” away from the scene and the driver of one car handcuffed and taken away in a police cruiser for allegedly driving drunk did the responders focus on the woman on the hood of the white car. “Do they…

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Lisa Charland

11:26 am on Friday, April 8, 2011

This is wonderful- every high school should do this.   more ›

SNEAK PEEK: Mock Accident at WMHS

Watch for the video and article coverage of the mock accident Friday.

Every two years, the Woburn Police Department, along with paramedics from Action Ambulance, put together a mock accident to drive home the point that drinking and driving don't mix.  This year's event was held this morning for juniors and seniors at Woburn Memorial High School. Woburn Patch will both video and article coverage of the event on Friday. Our friends at the Woburn Public Media Center will also air video of the mock accident on cable access. Check local listings for times. 

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