07:53 AM EDT on Friday, April 30, 2004

By KARA FINNSTROM / 6NEWS

6NEWS Four students were injured in the accident.

A crumpled mess of steel is all that’s left of a car several Hopewell High School teenagers were riding in. While the car is completely destroyed, the four teens are expected to be okay.

Michael Flowers, the 18-year-old driver, was pinned in the driver’s seat. He suffered a broken leg. The other three passengers are between ages 15 and 17. They suffered broken bones and head and neck pain.

Witnesses told investigators the 18-year old driver crossed a double yellow line on Beatties Ford Road to pass a driver. He lost control and flew off the road. The driver overcorrected and hit a utility pole, careened off that and hit a stump.

Flowers is facing number charges including reckless driving.

The crash is a snapshot of a widespread problem.

For every mile driven, drivers ages 16-19 are four times more likely to crash than older drivers.

Retired school teacher Paul Faulkner has taught driving more than 25 years. He said the crash is a perfect example of three of the most dangerous driving situations teenagers face. The first is a two lane road.

"Among teens I found that a lot of accidents occur on two lane roads because they run off the road, overcorrect, cross the center line and end up losing control of the car," Faulkner said.

The second is driving with other teenagers in the car.

"Statistics have proven that when there’s more than one person in the car, the active rate among teenagers goes up by 400 percent," Faulkner said.

The third is failing to buckle up. No one in the car Thursday was wearing a seatbelt.

Faulkner said one of his toughest challenges is to get across the impact of a crash. He said a driver traveling in a car at the speed of 60 mph at the time of a collision would feel an impact similar to the car falling nine stories.

According to a federal government study, the risk for motor vehicle crashes is higher among 16-19-year-olds than among any other age group. Teen drivers are four times more likely than older drivers to crash. The risk of a crash goes up with the number of teen passengers in the car.