“Host a “Teens & Trucks” Share the Road Safety Presentation. Large trucks and commercial motor vehicles are a vital and important part of our nation’s economy. These vehicles are the “”wheels of commerce”” for our nation. Over 91 percent of Tennessee communities depend exclusively on trucks to move their goods. While truck drivers do contribute to some traffic crashes, research shows that too many drivers of passenger cars, especially young people ages 16 to 24, unnecessarily endanger themselves by failing to recognize that large trucks and passenger cars differ in their handling characteristics. As a result, nearly 70 percent of traffic crashes involving large trucks and passenger cars are the fault of the car driver. Research indicates that teen drivers are over 50 percent more likely to crash in the first month of driving. Every day, motor vehicle crashes end more teen lives than cancer, homicide, and suicide combined (source: AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety). Tennessee ranks sixth in the nation for the number of fatal car crashes involving teens, according to an Allstate Insurance study. Over the past five years (January 1, 2009 – November 13, 2013), there have been 393 teen traffic fatalities in the state of Tennessee and 33 of these involved a large truck (source: Tennessee Department of Safety & Homeland Security). The “”Teens & Trucks”” program was created in collaboration with the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, the Arizona Trucking Association, and the Arizona Department of Public Safety and American Trucking Associations.”