Wearing a PFD and using the appropriate safety equipment shows your attitude about safety and will send a message to your campers about it as well. If one of your jobs as a counselor is to drive campers in a van, please remember that the van is not your family car Vans are longer, wider, slower, and higher and drive very differently than the vehicle you drive at home or at school. Van accidents occur every summer because counselors don t realize this. In addition, rural roads are very different than highways, freeways, or city streets. Rural roads are often crowned, higher in the middle than on the sides, which can cause the vehicle to steer to the right.
Rural roads are often more narrow and have soft shoulders.
Accidents with camp vans occur every summer when a van is driven too fast for the road conditions or when a wheel gets onto a soft shoulder, causing the driver to overcorrect or run off the road. Vans handle and respond one way when empty and another way when full of campers and equipment. If you are a driver, take your time, leave a little early, and drive at speeds appropriate for the road conditions, which aren t always the same as the posted speed limit. The rate of accidents at intersections is also higher for camp vans. The primary reason for this seems to be that the driver misjudges the timing of turns across oncoming traffic.