90 DAY DRUNK DRIVING CRACKDOWN
Georgia Governor's Office of Highway Safety (GOHS) announced a ninety-day roll-out of the high-visibility ROLLING THUNDER TASKFORCE into Carroll and Douglas Counties. The GOHS THUNDER TASKFORCE is a specialized traffic enforcement unit designed to help communities combat their abnormally high occurrences of traffic crashes, injuries and fatalities on local high-crash traffic corridors. The THUNDER TASKFORCE goal in Carroll and Douglas Counties will be to target high-risk drivers before they become involved in injury and fatality crashes.
“The TASKFORCE mission is to help reduce elevated highway deaths and serious injuries by altering the illegal driving behaviors of careless motorists through an increased law enforcement presence wherever there are high crash corridors in Georgia,” said Director Bob Dallas at the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety. The THUNDER TASKFORCE motorcade rolled into Carroll County Thursday, March 11th, 2010 for a news conference on the Daniel Road Bridge at I-20 at 3PM.
GOHS crash data shows Douglas and Carroll Counties need the GOHS ROLLING THUNDER TASKFORCE now more than ever. Here’s why: Douglas County experienced 21 traffic fatalities by mid-November, 2009. That exceeds their total fatal crash count for all of 2008. Once the complete 2009 data set is in, Douglas County is already on track to surpass its projected 2009 fatalities by 122%. If that occurs, Douglas County is about to reach a nine-year high in fatal crashes.
Neighboring Carroll County is also caught in a deadly highway crash count predicament. Carroll has one of the highest fatality rates of all 159 counties in Georgia. Carroll County has averaged 25 fatalities a year for the past nine years, designating Carroll with the highest highway fatality rate among other similarly sized counties. The THUNDER TASKFORCE goal will be to show a significant reduction in traffic fatalities and injuries in Carroll and Douglas Counties over the coming three-month period.
THUNDER has a history of helping counties with high crash corridors since the project’s inception in 2007 when it began combating traffic deaths in the Savannah-Chatham Metro Area, followed by lifesaving results in Bartow, Paulding, Barrow, and Oconee Counties in 2008. THUNDER also successfully turned around killer highway statistics for Bulloch County and the City of Statesboro, and in Glynn and McIntosh counties in 2009. Most recently, THUNDER produced record-breaking enforcement results in Houston County in 2010.
This combined THUNDER TASKFORCE roster includes: Carroll and Douglas County Sheriff’s Deputies and three local Police Departments from the West Georgia cities of Villa Rica, Carrollton, and Douglasville.
They will also be supported by a force-multiplier of law enforcement agencies in the Western Regional Traffic Enforcement Network (WRTEN), which includes Haralson, Carroll, Heard, Troup, Douglas, Coweta, Paulding, Harris and Meriwether Counties.
Georgia State Troopers from Troop B, C & D and state enforcement officers from the DPS Motor Carrier Compliance Division.
And a specially-qualified contingent of GOHS H.E.A.T. units from the Barrow, Bibb, Carroll, Douglas, and Paulding County Sheriff’s Offices and the Winder Police Department.
H.E.A.T. stands for Highway Enforcement of Aggressive Traffic. GOHS provides grant funding for traffic enforcement officers from 21 H.E.A.T. Units around the state to increase safety belt use and reduce speeding and impaired driving crashes. The TASKFORCE H.E.A.T. officers are certified as field sobriety or drug recognition experts, with required training in radar, emergency vehicle operation, pursuit intervention, advanced traffic law, and DUI Breathalyzer equipment operation. “Our THUNDER enforcement plan includes high-visibility patrols where vigilant H.E.A.T. officers take high-risk drivers off roads that are spiraling into high-crash corridors,” said GOHS Director Bob Dallas.
TASKFORCE officers conduct day-and-night safetybelt and sobriety roadchecks on local roadways on an ever-changing schedule while collecting enforcement data to document their life-saving progress. The THUNDER strategy applies concentrated patrols on state routes, rural roads, and interstate highways over the three month period.
In between weekly waves of THUNDER operations, Carroll and Douglas County Sheriff’s patrols will continue to target high injury and fatality crash locations with that rotating schedule of concentrated patrols and roadchecks. TASKFORCE Teams will receive logistical support from the WRTEN regional GOHS Traffic Enforcement Network. WRTEN will provide portable Blood Alcohol Testing “BAT”-Trailers, field-equipped with reporting stations, Intoxilyzers, night operations generators with street lighting-kits, and holding cells to conduct THUNDER sobriety roadchecks from February to April 2010.
For more information about Carroll and Douglas County THUNDER TASKFORCE events and scheduling contact GOHS Law Enforcement Coordinator Powell Harralson at 912-313-1581 or pharrelson@gohs.ga.gov or Western Regional Traffic Enforcement Network, WRTEN Coordinator, Deputy Greg Holcomb at the Carroll County Sheriff’s Office at 770-214-3596 or gholcomb@carrollsheriff.com .
(CARROLL & DOUGLAS COUNTIES) During its first two days of concentrated patrols and sobriety roadchecks, OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER Taskforce Teams swept-up 37 DUI’s in Carroll and Douglas Counties.
“That’s 37 drunk drivers who could have killed the people you know and love right at home on your local roadways,” said Director Bob Dallas of the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety. “This is the reason local law enforcement welcomed the Rolling THUNDER Taskforce to these West Central Counties.”
“Drunk drivers should consider Thursday’s THUNDER motorcade down I-20 into Villa Rica their one and only warning that THUNDER means Zero Tolerance for impaired driving,” said GOHS Law Enforcement Coordinator Powell Harrelson who organizes the initiative. “Drunk drivers go directly to jail.“
“These impaired drivers are the kind of extreme high-risk drivers we hope to continue rounding-up with OPERATION THUNDER,” said GOHS Director Bob Dallas. “We want to see impaired drivers behind bars before their reckless conduct behind the wheel puts families in Carroll and Douglas Counties in peril on the road.”
“Sometimes the enforcement waves are scheduled on weekdays and sometimes they’re on weekends. But once THUNDER operations begin, there will always be some kind of stepped-up enforcement during the next ninety days,” said LEC Harrelson. “The TASKFORCE will continue working unpredictable schedules and enforcement patterns. So illegal speeders and impaired drivers won’t know when and they won’t know where to look for blue lights in their rear view mirrors.”
“The random roadcheck schedule also explains why the THUNDER TASKFORCE continues to perform so well in the crime-fighting column,” said GOHS Director Bob Dallas. Officers at the first wave of roadchecks made a total of 20 drug arrests, 5 felony arrests, recovered one stolen vehicle, and apprehended 12 fugitives on outstanding warrants!
“Bad guys travel in cars like everyone else,” said Harrelson. “So when THUNDER starts up, local crime stats go down. Criminals have to stay mobile to stay in business. When we catch them behind the wheel running to and from crime scenes it hurts their profits. Handcuffs work just as well on getaway drivers as they do on drunk drivers.”
The THUNDER crackdown also netted 72 violators driving on revoked and suspended licenses. “Many times these same violators have already been caught driving drunk and had their licenses or insurance coverage revoked,” said Harrelson. TASKFORCE officers wrote 37 child safety seat citations, 42 seatbelt tickets, and made contacts with a total of 480 violators of all kinds during the two county crackdown.
The THUNDER strategy concentrates day-and-night patrol activity on interstates and state and local routes throughout the three-month period to keep the violators guessing,” said Carroll County Sheriff’s Deputy Greg Holcomb who serves as Law Enforcement Coordinator for the Western Regional Traffic Enforcement Network.
The TASKFORCE mission is to target high-risk drivers with high visibility enforcement and change their illegal driving behaviors. “Operation THUNDER is about raising survival rates, NOT raising revenue,” said Deputy Holcomb.
During the next enforcement wave, the THUNDER TASKFORCE plans a high-visibility speed and DUI crackdown to help achieve its lifesaving mission.
