It is the day before Thanksgiving, and while you may be busily preparing your house for friends and family, others are just counting down the hours until they can leave work and head out on the town. Thanksgiving Eve – also affectionately called Blackout Wednesday or Drinksgiving in some circles – is one of the most dangerous and deadly nights on the roads.
We don’t get much sleep on the night before Thanksgiving because we answer our phones 24 hours a day, and there are usually an influx of calls between midnight and 4 a.m. on this day. But why is the night before Thanksgiving such a perfect storm for DUIs? We explain three factors that lead to this spike in drunk driving arrests in this blog.
3 DUI Factors
Here are three reasons why tonight is one of the most deadly days on the roads.
1. Most People Have Thursday Off – If you’re like most people, odds are you have Thursday off. Even if you work retail or another job that is getting ready for Black Friday, oftentimes you don’t need to head in to work until the evening, meaning people have plenty of time to sleep in and nurse a potential hangover.
2. Seeing Old Friends – Many college-aged kids and young adults return to their hometowns to celebrate Thanksgiving with their family, but oftentimes they get back home the night before and want to catch up with some old friends that they haven’t seen in a while. The meet up spot for the night is typically a bar or place that serves alcohol, and it only takes a few drinks to put yourself over the limit. If you’re catching up with a bunch of friends over the course of a couple hours, you can easily and unknowingly drink yourself over the legal limit.
3. Extra DUI Enforcement – As we mentioned in yesterday’s post, more than 300 agencies across Minnesota will be conducting extra DUI patrols beginning tonight and running through the holiday weekend. They’ll be looking for the four most dangerous driving behaviors – drunk driving, distracted driving, speeding and failing to where a seat belt – but they will be really keeping an eye out for drunk drivers tonight because they know many people go out and drink the night before Thanksgiving. There will be more drunk drivers on the road tonight, and more police to catch them, so of course there will be an uptick in drunk driving arrests.
So tonight, whether you’re going out with friends or just driving to the store to pick up another can of cranberry sauce, please, make good decisions behind the wheel and keep an eye out for errant driving behaviors. If you end up in trouble, we can get you out of jail before the turkey hits the table tomorrow. Give us a call at (952) 224-2277. Have a safe and wonderful Thanksgiving.
