Texting While Driving: Bloody & Graphic PSA featured on The Today Show

***Comments are Moderated (no choice) please do not post any off-color remarks as your comment will not get approved.*** Two teen girls giggle over a text message they are sending while driving along a country road. Distracted, the driver smashes head-on into another car, and while the bloodied girls exchange dazed glances, a third car careens into the passenger side.

The driver finds her friend lying dead next to her. Then the camera switches to another smashed vehicle and shows a young child inside, asking why her parents are not waking up.

Produced by the Gwent Police Department and the Tredegar Comprehensive School with SPECIAL EFFECTS BY ZIPLINE CREATIVE www.ziplinecreative.co.uk the PSA sends out a horrid visual to illustrate the dangers of texting while driving. But it currently isnt being aired on U.S. television. However, you can use the following link to see the original PSA Trailer,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3_x0CcdMRA
This new upload does not require a login to view it.

A South Wales community of 550,000--located approximately 150 miles west of London--that many Americans have never even heard of seems an unlikely place for the discussion of dangers of texting-and-driving to be raised, but a visionary Gwent police department was up to the task. Police locked arms with filmmaker Peter Watkins-Hughes to produce the PSA, titled COW — The Film That Will Stop You Texting and Driving, named after the character Cassie Cowan, who unleashes the lethal chain of events by texting at the wheel.

Some 300 drama students from throughout Wales auditioned for the movie-like short, with local police cars and air ambulance helicopters used to lend an even more vivid reality to the film. Digital special effects were used to give viewers the you are there feeling of being inside Cowans vehicle as the road carnage ensues.

Gwents Chief Constable Mick Giannasi said it was the department's intent for the PSA to cut a wider swath than just Wales.

The messages contained in the film are as relevant to the people of Tennessee as they are to the residents (of Wales), he said on the department's Web site. Texting and driving can have tragic consequences, and the more this film is viewed, the better.

Appearing on TODAY Tuesday, noted ad executive Donny Deutsch said he believes the ad may be the most powerful ever — and agreed that it needs to be required viewing.

I will show this to every kid I know, and I salute the police department, Deutsch told TODAYs Ann Curry. I would really implore various local stations: run this stuff, put this on the air. It will help.

Recent studies show that texting while driving may be as dangerous and lethal as drunken driving. Up to a quarter of the estimated 40,000 vehicle fatalities in the U.S. annually may be traced back to distracted drivers texting. A recent Virginia Tech study found that texting drivers are 23 times more likely to be involved in a collision than non-texters. And although AAA reports 95 percent of drivers polled acknowledge texting while driving is dangerous, 21 percent of them have done it recently anyway.

But the cold, hard data is nothing compared to showing people up close and chillingly the human toll texting while driving can exact, Deutsch told Ann Curry on The Today Show.

Its one thing if I just say to you, You know what, Ann, you increase your risk 23 times when texting, and you go, OK, he said. We hear the numbers, we hear of the fatalities, but you never actually see it this graphic.

Its one thing to intellectually get it into our brains, but when you see it this graphically.I tell you, I couldnt get through this (ad).

There remains doubt whether the four-minute PSA will ever see the light of day on U.S. television screens TODAY ran segments of the Welsh police production, but not in its entirety. Curry asked Deutsch if the PSA will make it past U.S. censors, and he acknowledged, Theyre going to have a problem with that.

Currently, 17 states and the District of Columbia have laws on the books that ban texting while driving, and it appears the issue is soon to get even more government attention. The U.S. Transportation Department will hold a summit next month examining all forms of distracted driving, with texting being at the top of the list.
Press inquiries:
EDITOR Richard Jon Micklewright (You can message him on his channel (link above) for permissions, screenings etc) DIRECTOR Peter Watkins- Hughes is available for interviews, as is Gwent's Chief Constable Mick Giannasi, from the Gwent Police. http://www.gwent.police.uk/
As well as ZIPLINE CREATIVE special effects team at www.ziplinecreative.com.

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[tommyodonn999]

I am using this for my persuasive speech in class, if this does not help, what will?

[bevieboo92]

this is so sad:(

[blksabbath65]

this commercial should be shown on usa television.on a regular basis

[Chinchillalovermiya]

they do an organzitation called V.I.P for V.I.P came by my school and showed this video

[Colleen772]

I texted and drove before I watched this. Consider me converted.

[caroljean1960]

@redemption136 They are both just as dangerous, though I honestly hate texting and driving more than drinking and driving because I personally hate cell phones.

[caroljean1960]

@Usubaa I agree, that would probably be the one of the best things to ever happen in America.

[caroljean1960]

@ganymedeIV4 That wont help, they need to make it illegal to use a cell phone for ANYTHING in a car, and they should get rid of texting in phones. No one needs texting at all.

[Mamda07]

I think this video is very powerful. I just saw it last night and wish they had this video when I was in high school. Every high school should show this video. It would have been far more powerful than the Trauma Nurses presentation.

[spider5600]

This maybe a bit of ignorance on my part but would a PSA like this really struggle to be put on Prime-Time TV in the US. I mean it was featured on the BBC and they showed the full 30 min PSA during Prime Time hours. Are US tv stations a bit more cautious about what they show?