A RECENT Monday morning proved to be both a shocking and powerful one for Year 13 students, giving us all a serious wake up call and opening our eyes to the consequences of unsafe driving; not just when behind the wheel, but as passengers as well.

It was the Safe Drive conference: a presentation by the emergency services on the severe dangers of driving recklessly.

Members of the police, fire and rescue and those from the medical field united in Worthing Pavilion to inform us all of their horrific experiences with traffic accidents, or as they called them, Road Traffic Collisions, or 'RTCs'.

Their first hand accounts of the chaos and carnage unleashed a far greater impact with the use of a short film, which depicted a girl having the time of her life at a nightclub on her 18th birthday with her sister and friends, only for the night to end in her death as a result of an alcohol-fuelled collision with a tree.

That video may have been fiction, but it conveyed the harsh reality of something that unfortunately happens frequently. It delivered a disturbing new way of saying no to the potentially, and often fatal cocktail of drinking and driving.

The controversial THINK! campaign's adverts from television were also shown, and in what was most likely the most hard hitting portion of the event, the appearance of actual victims of RTCs, not just those involved, but those affected.

A lady who lost both of her sons in a short space of time in two separate incidents gave her story of heartbreak, and so did a young man who lost his best friend and became partially paralysed in a crash, not due to driving under the influence, or speeding for that matter, but simply inexperience.

The presentation focused on safe driving as a whole, but more specifically highlighted drinking and driving, experience, and wearing a seatbelt.

In a morning that opened with the enthusiasm of students from across the county, a local DJ raised the mood still with music and multi-coloured lights, getting the Sixth Form students from Steyning Grammar School, King's Manor, The College of Richard Collyer, and Our Lady Of Sion school to sing along.

Bemused as to why there was a DJ at this conference, it all became clear when the sickening sound of crunching metal blasted around the Pavilion, and images of car crashes interrupted him.

It was powerful contrast, showing how normality and happiness can change in a heartbeat into death and destruction.