Six Tips for a Safe Halloween
With Halloween around the corner, there are sure to be ghouls and goblins knocking on doors and demanding sugary treats. Below are some tips to keep these little “monsters” safe while out trick-or-treating.- Use reflective tape on costumes to help night drivers identify pedestrians. Most costumes are dark in color and can render pedestrians nearly invisible to drivers. By adding reflective tape to a costume, you can help assure that drivers will see someone in the road.
- Carry a flashlight to avoid hidden pitfalls while going door-to-door. Walking down dark streets and cutting across lawns that may not be well lit can hide dangers causing you to trip and fall, possibly spraining an ankle or bumping your head.
- NEVER eat unwrapped candy or candy with damaged packaging. Although we would all like to think our neighbors are benevolent people, the truth is, you never know who could be the “bad apple” of the bunch. If a stranger is handing out candy with easily resealable packaging or no packaging at all, it is best to throw these items away. You cannot be sure that they have not tampered with the treat in some way.
- Travel in groups at all times. Safety in numbers is an age old rule that applies as much today as ever. Predators will often forego approaching a group of kids in favor of a lone child as they are more vulnerable. Although not comforting, this tip is imperative to keeping children safe.
- Wear a mask that does not obstruct your vision too much. Most Halloween masks obstruct the wearer’s view by cutting off peripheral vision. By finding a mask that allows some peripheral vision, you can better assess your surroundings and the potential dangers around you. This can help avoid a litany of issues including being hit by a car you couldn’t see, bumping into a passerby, tripping over unseen objects, etc.
- Travel on sidewalks whenever possible. Halloween is a very exciting night for kids, and the tendency to wander into the road is much higher on Halloween than other nights of the year. Kids and parents alike are crossing the street constantly and sometimes this creates a false sense of security for trick-or-treaters. They believe that drivers will see the throngs of people and slow or stop well ahead of time. While this may be true for most drivers, all it takes is one driver who is too close to the edge of the road where you are walking or one driver to look down for a moment and not see you crossing the street to cause serious injuries. Trick-or-treaters should choose streets they know have sidewalks in order to limit the amount of time spent on the roadway and your exposure to night time drivers. This news story is a prime example of the inherent danagers of the roadway on Halloween.
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