I received some great information from one of my clients who actually just did an online course on this subject. I thought the information was great so I am passing it along as PART TWO of driving safe with your pets!

Use common sense! Keep the fur babies in the back! No matter how much the pet enjoys it. Do we allow small children to ride in the front seat?  Pets in the front seat can be thrown into the dashboard or ejected from the vehicle during an accident or sudden stop.  Pets will also climb on your lap and interfere with driving or fall down by the gas and brake pedals, risking an accident.

Airbags  Launch at a speed of 150 – 200 mph in two-tenths of a second. In addition to the accident, the airbag impact alone can cause serious injury to a pet.

Safety restraints When driving at 35 MPH, an unrestrained, ejected 50 pound dog can cause an impact of over 2000 pounds to the driver (and itself) in the event of an accident. This can cause serious injury – or death – to both your pet and vehicle occupants.  

The most common type of collision is on the front driver’s-side.  This type of impact will throw everything in the vehicle straight at the driver, including pets, occupants or objects.  It is imperative that pets be restrained in a vehicle at all times.  

NOTE: During or following a collision, the risk of a pet escaping, running into traffic or worse is a very real concern. Animal owners can reduce this risk significantly through the use of a pet restraint such as a safety harness, cabin divider, or specially designed carry case. These can be purchased inexpensively at any major pet store.  Unrestrained, frightened or injured  pets can impede the ability of first responders to rescue vehicle occupants – and your pet.

The hot seat  Even though you’ll only be gone ‘for just a second’, a few seconds is all it takes for the temperature inside your vehicle to climb to extreme levels, creating a potentially deadly situation for children and pets. 

According to a General Motors study, temperatures inside a recently air-conditioned vehicle can exceed 122 degrees in 20 minutes on a 95-degree day, and continue to rise from there. Temperatures at this dangerous level will quickly overwhelm your pet’s ability to regulate it’s own body temperature, causing serious injury or worse. …and don’t even THINK about leaving a window slightly open or “cracked”, according to the same study, this will do little or nothing to cool your pet.

Information compiled by Scottsdale-based eLearning company, The Learning Design Group. www.TheLearningDesignGroup.com