Technology is a wonderful thing or, at least, it can be wonderful. The key to technology is to use it the right way – to use it safely.

The microwave is quite a convenience when we want to heat a meal quickly. We all know, however, that it tends to backfire if we try to cook that meal in a metal pan. The same principle holds true with cellular phones.

Auto manufacturers have spent untold hours and dollars looking for ways to knock even a fraction of a second off of the braking time of the vehicles they manufacture. The point is that, in an emergency situation, fractions of a second count. It’s also true of emergency driving situations that we usually don’t have a lot of warning.

If we knew a truck would blow a stop sign and cross our path at 65 mph, we’d reduce our speed long before there was a potential collision. But, in an emergency, we don’t know the truck driver isn’t paying attention to the stop sign. These critical fractions of a second can mean the difference between a relatively uneventful drive and a trip to the hospital or morgue.

If our attention is also diverted, we lose those critical instances of hope. If we’re not paying close enough attention, we’re not always ready to react and avoid an accident.

Using a cell phone, especially texting on a cell phone, dramatically increases the likelihood that we’ll lose critical seconds in an emergency while driving. Just as we wouldn’t drive our car without properly operating brakes, Denny Norton, of Ringwood based Performance Unlimited, said it’s a form of Russian roulette to operate a car without focusing on the job at hand – driving.

“I’ve driven in stockcar races,” Norton said. “I can tell you that, even with professional drivers, most accidents happen when someone doesn’t react quickly enough to an emergency. That’s especially true on the public roadways where everyone isn’t going in the same direction and where our paths cross.”