By Lydia Bradley

With winter slowly setting in, the roads in the morning and late evenings can become packed with snow and ice but these road conditions can be very dangerous if you aren’t prepared for them. In 2013, 182 accidents took place due to the unsafe roads. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has published some tips that will help prevent crashes. First off, always make sure that your car is well maintained. This means make sure that your tires are good tread on them and that your battery will start in the cold. Also in your vehicle make sure that you have jumper cables and various other supplies that will help you get your car out of a pickle. Other supplies like a shovel will come in handy especially when you end up getting stuck in some parking lot. Other materials could include ice scrapers and even blankets for when you are standing on the side of the road. Before you decide to go anywhere, it is always a good idea to plan your route. This could include looking at the local weather and traffic problems to see what the roads will look like. Once you head out to make your journey into the arctic weather, you also need to know how your vehicle will react in the snow and ice. It is a good idea to know how your vehicle’s brakes  react–see how your brakes react when you will stomp on antilock brakes and when you pump on non-antilock. But of course, when you test this out make sure that you are in a empty parking lot so that you won’t hit any other vehicles. But even though there are all of these tips that can help you be more prepared, it really is learning how to do all of this. Learning to drive in the snow takes experience and it also may mean learning to drive without distractions like phones or driving with the radio up loud. But these tips can only come handy when you are driving aggressively. The only way to make sure that you are prepared to deal with the snow is to just drive in it. Experience is what makes the difference. As long as you know you can drive in the snow, you will be able to drive in any Make sure that when you are driving, you leave plenty of space between your car and the other drivers that are out on the road.  Safe driving in winter weather is one of the most crucial things to learn do in Colorado.