The Virginia State Police plan extra patrols on the road and in the air this weekend to catch aggressive drivers on three major highways.
The crackdown on dangerous driving, known as Operation Air, Land & Speed, will be focused locally on Interstate 95. Extra patrols also are scheduled for Interstate 81 and a section of Interstate 77 in southern Virginia.
Troopers in patrol cars, helicopters and airplanes will look for vehicles that are speeding, weaving through traffic and committing other unsafe acts. Since Memorial Day weekend, 20 people have died on Virginia interstate highways, including four on I-95 and one at the I-495 and I-95 interchange in Northern Virginia.
“We are losing too many adults, teenagers and children to speed, driver inattention, alcohol and a lack of seat belt usage,” said Col. Steven Flaherty, superintendent of the state police.
Efforts to stop aggressivedriving go beyond law enforcement agencies.
This week the Vatican issued a list of 10 commandments for motorists, which forbid “impoliteness, rude gestures, cursing, blasphemy, loss of sense of responsibility or deliberate infringement of the highway code.”
The commandments also recommend drivers and their passengers perform the sign of the cross and say the rosary during trips. The Vatican suggested the rosary because the prayers’ “rhythm and gentle repetition” will not distract drivers.
Vehicles, the Vatican also warned, can become an “occasion for sin” if driven dangerously or used in prostitution.
AAA estimates that aggressive driving leads to at least 1,000 deaths per year in the mid-Atlantic region.
“Too often we go to church on Sunday and then get back on the road and employ the philosophy ‘an eye for an eye,’ instead of ‘do unto others,’ ” AAA spokeswoman Martha Meade said.
