Tips for Winter Driving

Winter is coming faster than many might think. The roads become slick and a lot more accidents happen because you don’t have as much control when there is snow on them.

Officer Douglas Boivie shared his tips for driving in the winter.

“The main one: slow down. Everyone leaves at the same time when there’s ice on the road. In the state of Idaho, when there is the speed limit there is also a driving law that is called ‘speed too fast for conditions’. So it means if the speed limit says 35 and there is ice and snow on the road and you are going 30 and you spin out and hit the car in front of you, you can still get the ticket because you were going too fast for conditions. The way that code means is if you are ever driving faster than you can control your car, you can go too fast so there is no speed associated with it. The number one problem we have is that no one ever wants to wake up earlier and leave earlier so they all leave at the same time so they still want to drive whatever the speed limit is and then they get in wrecks and think it’s not their fault when it is,” Officer Boivie said.

Driving in the snow can be dangerous so you have to prepare and drive at the speed that is safest for the weather. Many people don’t want to take the time to scrape their windshields off but if you don’t you can get a ticket.

“The other tip is to scrape your windshield. It’s against the law to only scrape off a 2 feet area. Your whole front windshield is required by Idaho law to be all the way scraped off. The whole front windshield has to be 100 percent clear or you can get a ticket for driving with a vision obstruction. Give yourself the time to scrape it all off,” Officer Bovie said.