Only turkeys don’t buckle up for Thanksgiving travel. The Missouri Department of Transportation urges everyone before they head out on the road this holiday to take a moment and buckle up. And, if you drive a pickup truck – this especially means you.

A department study shows pickup truck drivers and their passengers are among those least likely to wear their safety belts regularly. The current pickup truck safety belt usage rate is only 66 percent compared to the nearly 80 percent in passenger cars and 82 percent in vans and SUVs.

“Wearing your safety belt is your best defense against serious injury or death in a traffic crash and it only takes a few seconds to buckle up,” said Leanna Depue, director of highway safety for MoDOT. 

In 2005, crashes involving pickup trucks resulted in 357 deaths and 17,656 injuries. Of the 357 people killed in these crashes, 72 percent were not wearing their safety belts. Of the 223 people killed in pickup trucks, 82 percent were not wearing their safety belt.

To combat this problem and help reduce the number of fatalities and serious injuries on the roadways, the Missouri Coalition for Roadway Safety, in conjunction with National Highway Safety Administration and other highway safety and law enforcement leaders, developed an aggressive new public awareness campaign called Buckle Up In Your Truck. The campaign’s efforts began this summer in four states in the central United States, including Missouri, to try to increase safety belt usage rates among pickup truck drivers and passengers.

This Thanksgiving, MoDOT is reminding you to continue to buckle up in your truck.

“Thanksgiving means a lot of people are going to be on the roads traveling to visit their family and friends,” Depue said. “Heavy traffic coupled with Missouri weather and the potential to meet an impaired driver on the road could mean dangerous driving conditions, so it’s important to wear your safety belt to Arrive Alive.”