The Saudi Association for Traffic Safety in cooperation with the Traffic Safety Committee in UoD organized a Gulf Traffic Unified Event which consisted of various programs and lectures. The driving safely challenge was one of the event’s programs which aimed at improving the driving level of students and staff members of UoD. The challenge consisted of a pretend car that helps in convincing people to fasten their seat belt during driving. This is achieved through experiencing a virtual car accident where the participant sits in a seat, fastens his seat belt then the device runs at 20 kilometers per hour. This challenge helped change participants’ opinions concerning seat belts and aspired them to take better choices in the future.
Dr. Abdulhameed Al Moajel, head of the Saudi Association for Traffic Safety mentioned that “around 1800 students and staff members of the University participated in the event, the participants gained useful information that will help in raising their awareness level towards safety during driving through the advice given to them by Abrahim Al Garawi, Abdulkhaliq Al Boaigan, Emad Al Mbrzi and volunteers of the association. The safety challenge affirmed the importance of keeping a safe distance between cars, respecting the established speed rate, the correct way to stop at a red light and the importance of using exit signs.
The president of UoD Dr. Abdullah Al Rubaish visited the event and firmly declared the importance of such events which are considered a creative way to aware youths to the importance of traffic safety. Furthermore, Lieutenant Colonel. Jameel Al Onizi the Assistant Director of Al Khobar Traffic Directorate visited the event and gave a lecture about the importance of obliging to traffic rules and Trainer Mohamed Al Noaimi from Saudi Aramco gave a lecture about values that contribute to driving safely and the importance of learning the essentials and basics of driving safely. Also, Gen. Fahad Al Fraidan the commander of the Technical Institute of Naval Studies in the Eastern Province visited the event.
The lecture given by Lieutenant Colonel. Jameel Al Onizi was held in the Deanship of Preparatory and Supporting Studies building and attended by Preparatory year students, the Dean of Preparatory and Supporting Studies Dr. Abdulaziz Al Fuhaid and the coordinator of the activity Dr. Ahmed Abduljaid. Lieutenant Colonel. Al Onizi spoke about traffic violations that have an effect on the overall safety of the public as well as that he spoke about the different penalties imposed by the system for offenders. At the end of the lecture Lieutenant Colonel. Al Onizi gave the students a number of advices that should be given to all who drive, he explained that one should not be careless during driving and not to be preoccupied with things such as mobile phones because most of the accidents nowadays are due to texting while driving. Therefore, the traffic directorate established strict regulations to reduce this phenomena. After his lecture Lieutenant Colonel. Al Onizi received questions and enquires from the students and they discussed the most common problems they face during driving and the best solutions to decreases traffic accidents.
Later on, Trainer Mohamed Al Noaimi spoke in his lecture about the correct steps towards becoming a perfect driver, the first and formost step is to be ready for change and to be tolerant and patient during driving. Al Noaimi gave a number of statistics which indicate that the rising number of accidents is due to texting while driving where 66% of accidents are due to that.
At the end of the lectures the Dean of Preparatory and Supporting Studies Dr. Abdulaziz Al Fuhaid presented a memorial gift of appreciation to Lieutenant Colonel. Jameel Al Onizi and Trainer Mohamed Al Noaimi for their efforts in helping the deanship achieve the goal of this event.
