Today, Polaroid has made publicly available, the results of European research into the dangers of low-angled winter sunlight, to alert UK drivers to this hazard. The survey was conducted amongst 1,001 car drivers and exposes alarming findings. Low-angled sun can turn everyday driving situations into hazardous conditions, resulting in driving fatigue and most alarmingly leading to temporary sun-blindness that can lead to serious accidents and even fatalities. Whilst motorists find driving with low sun difficult, many could take the simple step of wearing polarized sunglasses that can improve visibility and reduce the risk of accidents.
"Drivers are aware of the benefits of wearing seatbelts and maintaining safe driving speeds," comments Jacques Basson, Country Manager for Polaroid Eyewear UK, "however, only around half of motorists wear sunglasses, and most of those that do, don't have polarized lenses. They just don't realise that something as simple as forgetting to wear sunglasses can compromise their own safety as well as the safety of pedestrians and other drivers."
As daylight hours become shorter, more and more motorists are travelling into a low sun. Whilst in the summer, the vehicle's sun-visor screens out direct rays of sunlight, the low-angled sun which motorists experience in winter, is too low for the visor to be effective. Everyday situations such as pedestrians crossing roads, vehicles stopping unexpectedly or cars changing lanes can become potentially hazardous when low angled sun impairs motorists' ability to see clearly.
Out of nine different types of road and weather conditions, 93% of motorists rated low angled sunlight as the most difficult, with 47% stating that low sun is very hazardous. The next most difficult driving condition was slipperiness on a wet road. Half of all drivers admitted to suffering from eye fatigue caused by winter sunlight, whilst driving.
Despite finding low sun a real problem, half (51%) of all motorists surveyed still get behind the steering wheel without wearing sunglasses. Road tests conducted by Polaroid analyzed the reactions of a non-professional driver, travelling at a constant speed of 50km (around 30 miles) per hour into the glare of strong light when a hazardous object was introduced onto the road.
The study revealed that by simply wearing polarized sunglasses the driver's vision improved, thereby cutting reaction times dramatically and reducing the risk of accidents.
In the controlled experiment, when the driver didn't wear sunglasses at all, they were far more likely to hit the object because glare prevented them from seeing and stopping in time. When wearing ordinary sunglasses the driver's reaction time was slightly better and they stopped 3 metres in front of the object, but still too close for comfort. With polarized sunglasses from Polaroid the driver was able to stop safely, a full 10 metres away from the object. The experiment clearly showed that wearing polarized sunglasses cuts the risks associated with driving in low-angled sun dramatically.
When questioned, motorists felt that wearing sunglasses addressed the problem of driving with a low sun. However, ordinary sunglasses are not enough. They simply make everything darker and let glare through making it hard for drivers to see properly. Polaroid polarized lenses can avoid this as they cut out the blinding glare that causes eye fatigue, squinting, poor vision and at worst temporary sun-blindness.
Having invented polarizing lens technology in the 1930s, Polaroid continues to be an innovator and now uses a unique lens press-polishing technique that is the latest technology. Polaroid polarizing sunglasses provide distortion-free lens performance, high levels of scratch-resistance and unsurpassed anti-glare capability. The lenses block out virtually all horizontally-reflected glare, providing the highest level of glare reduction available, making road conditions clearer and driving safer.
"When you drive in low-angled winter sun without polarized
sunglasses on, you're taking an unnecessary risk," comments
Basson, "Polaroid sunglasses provide over 99% glare-free vision,
so we urge all motorists to keep their polarized sunglasses handy
and most importantly to put them on!"