One of the less obvious but equally important benefits of Aces High might be its participants' situational awareness improvement for surviving today's highway kamikazes.
For example, the Washington, D.C., area has some of the U.S.'s most challenging traffic missions, and rarely a day passes without some driving lapse that makes a person grateful for Aces High heads-up experiences.
Two of the latest incidents demonstrate how Aces High situational alertness might be saving lives in real life.
(1) Twice in three days now in Northern Virginia I've had to dodge a car zipping straight at me across an intersection on the turn-only signal (when cars beside them started turning, they just started out straight ahead all by themselves);
(2) but the most flagrant violation I've seen in a long time was in Maryland the other day when a Camaro, stopped at a side road heading on to a main road, leisurely pulled across the double yellow line around three cars ahead of it -- which is bad enough --and then at the red light turned not right on red but LEFT on red across the intersection!
Okay, the second example didn't require anything except sitting still and closing my gaping mouth after witnessing that stupid Camaro manuever. But there are countless other examples when general increased alertness and defensive driving, such as checking 6 in traffic, especially the blind spots at 4 and 8 o'clock, has prevented a lot of grief.
It boils down to expecting the unexpected that keeps a cyber pilot intact in today's traffic. How many times have you been in traffic and muttered "This is just like Aces High!" and been grateful for your extra situational awareness?
So should insurance companies reduce auto premiums for Aces High members? Aces High has to rate greater savings than steering wheel locks.
Thus we have another interesting thread: Since participating in Aces High, how many of you have flawless driving records, i.e., never caused an accident or received traffic points for driving violations? Or take your cyber benefits all the way back to Air Warrior too.
Does Aces High make you a better driver and contribute to your driving safety record?
(If Aces High makes you hyper aggressive and fuels instead of alleviates road rage, kindly start a separate thread.)
