Emergency services have to deal with tough situations every day, including having to notify family members that a loved one has died in an accident or Seriously injured .
One thing that makes their job more difficult, is when family members learn of a death first, from social media.
Over the past few years a disturbing trend has developed,the need to post photographs or video photage online of car collisions.
These days, everyone’s a photographer. Millions of people around the country are walking around with internet-enabled cameraphones in their pockets. In the circumstances, it’s surprising we don’t see more images and videos taken at the scenes of crimes, road deaths and other misadventures popping up on Twitter or Facebook but for people been mindful of those actions how they might effect other.
Some relatives can arrive on the crash scene after learning of the crash on line where The emergency services are not prepared to deal with such a situation . So road safety professionals want you to think about how a family could be affected when you post words or pictures of accidents or crime scenes on social media.
“Social media is an easy outlet for people to get information to a vast number of people instantly,” said Noel Gibbons road safety officer . “When someone finds out about a death of a loved one in a message, where it’s such a broad spectrum it’s very impersonal and obviously a shock to the person when they find out.
Sometimes it’s enough to know that horrible things happen without having to see them.“
Gardai say drivers using mobile phones to take photos at collision scenes can be charged with distracted driving.
Media outlets also try to be sensitive when posting images of accidents and crime scenes and it’s their policy not to release any names of people who have lost their lives until the Gardai have notified next of kin.
What are your thoughts on this? Tell us in the Facebook post comments?