I think by now it's pretty obvious you shouldn't talk on a cell phone when you're doing something else.

This past summer, for example, I was out in Narragansett Bay in my 16-foot canoe when my editor phoned from the Phoenix. I reached into the watertight bag where I keep things like my car keys and wallet, and pulled out my Nokia. I don't remember what we talked about. But suddenly I noticed a plume of water coming toward me from under the Newport/Pell Bridge.

"Hey, gotta go," I yelled into the phone. "I think the Anna is about to run me down."

My reference was to the Providence-to-Newport "commuter ferry" run by the Rhode Island Public Transportation Authority. It goes up and down the bay at full-throttle during the tourist season, in a vain attempt to approximate the running time of RIPTA's more efficient busses.

I told my editor I'd call him back, if I survived, and started paddling like mad, managing not only to get out of the Anna's way, but to swing my canoe around just in time to catch the ferry's surf-like wake. Another narrow escape by another stupid cell phone user.

Look, cell phones are as dangerous as they are convenient. Their portability means they can be used anywhere, so people use them anywhere. And they don't pay attention to much else.

For the past couple of years, researchers have been trying to see if this view stands up to scientific rigor.

Earlier, we reported that University of Rhode Island researchers are using portable cameras to track the eye movements of people who drive and phone (see "Driven to distraction by cell phones," News, This just in, August 2). The researchers are finding that big talkers aren't getting the big picture. Focused on their conversations, cell phone users seem to develop tunnel vision, seeing only a portion of the road.

Recently, Harvard University's Center for Risk Analysis took a crack at the subject. These are the folks who tell us there's a one-in-397 chance of dying of a heart attack this year, but only a one-in-4.5 million chance of taking a fatal lightening strike.

Harvard concluded that with increasing cell phone use, the risks are increasing. As many as 2600 people may be killed each year in phone-related crashes. That's about six percent of the nation's 42,000 highway fatalities.

Still, the study said there's not enough evidence to conclude that the benefits of phones in cars (being able to summon a rescue crew to tend the person you just crashed into, for instance) outweigh the dangers.

I began wondering what the odds were that the Harvard guys talk-and-drive, too. As luck would have it, Harvard's Web site listed the cell phone of David Ropeik, the communications contact. I dialed the number, hoping to catch him careering along Storrow Drive or the Fresh Pond Parkway.

Ring, ring, ring, ring.

No answer.

Just voice mail.

What, I ask you, are the chances of that?

Later, Ropeik called back, from the safety of his office.

So, do Risk Center experts drive and talk?

Ropeik admitted he does, but just a little. He tries to follow sensible rules: not using it in "hairy" traffic situations, dialing when the car is stopped, keeping conversations brief.

As for Dr. Joshua Cohen, the researcher who did the study, Ropeik says that Cohen owns a cell phone, but rarely uses it. "It's got dust on it," Ropeik says.

Issue Date: December 20 - 26, 2002