Police Officer Shares A Trick For A Better Night Vision While Driving

Statistics support that fatal crashes occur four times more in the night as compared to fatal crashes during the day. Is this because there the number of drunk drivers in the night is significantly higher than during the day or is it because of the absence of sufficient illumination during the night. Both of these factors are contributing to the statistics already mentioned and there is more to it – the fact that at night, the cars from the opposite direction strikes and glares the driver’s eyes causing seconds of temporary blindness. This officer discussed a simple but very efficient way of dealing with this situation.

He started by pointing out the biological response of the human eye to light during the night. When light strikes the pupils, it will constrict to control the entry of light into the eye. This is a defensive response to protect the eye from too much light. When it is dark, the pupil of the eye will dilate to allow as much light to enter. These are auto responses thus, we have no control over it. Now, when driving at night, the interval of dilating and constricting happens with seconds where the driver experiences momentary blindness. When the car at the opposite lane approaches, the pupil constricts and seconds thereafter, when the car passes, the eye is confronted with total darkness which it cannot instantly cope by dilating – it requires few seconds before it will dilate so that the driver’s eye can adjust to the darkness. Those few seconds may prove significantly fatal. Anyone who experienced driving knows that a split of a second is vital in driving as it could define the bounds of whether or not an accident will occur.

This clever officer suggests this life-saving hack: When in a situation mentioned above, close one eye. This will allow you to have one eye, accustomed to darkness and thus is already dilated while the other eye is focused on the grid of the road. If you do this, when the car passes by and you are confronted with darkness, simply open that eye you closed and you can have a better vision compared to when both eyes were glared by the lights of the approaching car travelling the opposite lane.

This life hack is so useful especially that there are other drivers who are not considerate – they drive with their high beam on. With that level of illumination, even if you are wearing anti-glare glasses, the eye will certainly need more time to adjust to the dark part of the road – enough time to lead a driver plunging into a ravine of certain death.

Do you usually drive at night? What precautions do you observe aside from making sure that you will not sleep while driving? Try this trick when driving at night especially if your route passes through passages that have low illumination like tunnels, winding and circuitous roads at the outskirt of the city or in uninhabited areas where there is lack of street lights. Drive safely.