Combat Edge: Judgment call ends life

During my 2-plus years as a Safety professional, I had gotten used to running out to investigate a minor mishap here and there. Someone used the wrong tool for the job at hand, sprained an ankle during basketball, tweaked a muscle in their back, or stepped off a curb wrong and broke a bone. Then I received a different kind of call. An active duty member had lost his life, a spouse had lost a husband, and coworkers had lost a friend. I was faced with approaching his friends and loved ones during this terrible time of grief and expecting them to give me personal details about the circumstances surrounding this tragic loss. When I realized that this loss of life had been unnecessary because it resulted from a very bad decision to drink and drive, my task became that much tougher.

Talking to some of his friends and loved ones was one of the most difficult things I have done. At the same time that I was asking some tough questions to get to the truth, I had to be sensitive and sympathetic to the feelings of those involved. The way I did this was to allow the interviewees to open up and talk freely about the person and the incident. I have found that whenever I ask a closed-ended question, I tend to get a closed-ended answer. I strived to establish a good rapport with the interviewees, which seemed to make them more comfortable with talking and answering my questions. These methods helped me discover some very valuable information.

The young airman in this particular investigation had decided to go out with some old friends to have a few drinks. He knew before he left that he would be drinking, so he planned ahead and asked his wife to pick him up when he was ready to go. Somewhere along the way -- after several beers -- he changed his plan and decided to have a friend drive him home instead. There was only one problem; he was not able to contact his friend. He did leave a voice message on his friend's phone, but verbal contact was never made. For a reason we will never know, he did not resort back to his original plan and call his wife. There he was at a bar fully loaded with keys in hand.

Unfortunately, he never made it home. While he had full intentions at the beginning of the evening to have someone else drive him home, he did not follow through. When he changed his plan, he changed his fate. If he had stuck to his original course of action, he would still be a husband, a friend, a coworker, and a valuable Air Force member. The other thing I discovered is that friends can also take a more proactive role in looking out for each other. I believe the outcome of this case might have been different if someone within his group of friends had decided to be the designated driver at the start of the evening. Counting on someone to pick you up at a time to be determined after a few drinks leads to too many uncertainties. It is not a good idea to rely on your ability to rationally think through these uncertainties after you have been drinking.

This is just one case where failure to use good personal risk management resulted in a loss of life. Driving while intoxicated is as dangerous as playing Russian roulette with a loaded gun. Not only are you jeopardizing your own life, but you are also endangering the lives of others. The outcome in this case could have been much worse. Several lives could have been lost and, thankfully, that did not happen. But the loss of this one person has had repercussions that will continue to ripple through the lives of those he touched when he was alive.

Remember this, getting behind a steering wheel after drinking is not an accident; it's a choice. We've lost too many of our valuable Air Force family members to this senseless act. As supervisors, coworkers, and friends, continue to stress the dangers of drinking and driving. If our people know we are serious about our concern for their safety, hopefully, they will begin to take it a little more seriously too.