It is the holiday season again — a time for celebration withfamily and friends, but it can also be time for mourning.

The holiday season can be one of the most dangerous times of year.

Why?

Because people celebrating and drinking with their friends maylater get behind the wheel of a car and drive while under theinfluence of alcohol.

In 2000, 1,233 people were killed and 30,971 people were injuredin alcohol related crashes in California. This averages out to oneperson killed every seven hours and one person injured every 17minutes in an alcohol-related crash.

Because of statistics like this, December is California’s Drunkand Drugged Driving Prevention Month. Law enforcement agencies areworking together to help raise awareness about driving under theinfluence and to encourage people to celebrate the holidaysresponsibly.

In the College Area, however, there is a year-round effort todecrease alcohol related accidents. This weekend, University Policeofficers were specifically designated to do DUI enforcement aroundcampus.

Officers staked out various locations to catch people drivingwhile impaired by alcohol.

University Police Officer Doug Miller said the kind of DUIsportrayed on television are the worst case scenarios. In most cases,a person driving under the influence is not swerving back and forthacross the road, for example, but just running a stop sign.

There are two techniques officers use to catch drunk drivers. Thefirst is to stop cars for various traffic violations until a drunkdriver emerges.

Through the second method, an officer will sit on the side of aroad and observe traffic patterns. If one driver is deviating fromwhat the other cars are doing, then that person is pulled over.

For example, if an officer is staked out near a stop sign andobserves that most people are slowing down for the stop, even if theyare not stopping completely, that is the pattern of traffic for thatarea. If a driver runs through the stop sign without slowing, thenthat driver will be pulled over.

When Miller pulls a car over, he will check the driver’s eyes witha small light to see if they are bloodshot and check for gazenessstagness, which is lack of smooth movement while following the light,and jerking in the corners of the eyes. He will also smell foralcohol on the driver’s breath.

If alcohol is detected on the driver’s breath and his eyesindicate possible intoxication, the person is then subject to a fieldcoordination test, which lasts about 40 minutes.

Field coordination tests are divided attention tests. The subjectis asked to follow a series of directions that involve bothconcentration and coordination. If a driver is intoxicated, eithercoordination will slip during these tests because he is thinkingabout the directions or he will fail to follow the directionsthoroughly because he is concentrating on coordination.

Because alcohol slowly shuts down the brain, it is difficult for aperson under the influence to concentrate on more than one task at atime, Miller said.

For example, one test involves the subject standing on one footand counting 30 seconds out loud. If the subject is impaired byalcohol, then he may forget to count because he is concentrating onstaying up, or he may not be able to stand up straight.

There is no one way for a subject to fail a field coordinationtest, Miller said.

“Some people think that if you put your foot down during the oneleg stand, then you fail,” he said. “It’s more subjective than that.After everything is taken into account, I look over my notes and seeif a pattern has emerged. That is how I determine if it is safe forthat person to continue driving.”

After the coordination tests, officers use a portable breath testto see what the driver’s blood alcohol level is. The legal limit forpeople 21 years old and up is .08.

Miller said about 25 percent of people pulled over for suspicionof drunk driving are arrested.

If an officer decides the person is unfit to drive, that person ishandcuffed and taken to jail. There, the driver is tested on anotherbreath machine to check blood alcohol level or possibly given a bloodtest.

If a person is arrested for a DUI and is a local resident, thenthat person remains in jail for eight hours, until he or she issober.

If the driver is found to have a blood alcohol level of .08 orhigher, then that person’s driver’s license is taken away and a30-day temporary license is granted. If the person is convicted, heor she can lose driving privileges from four months to one year.

On the first DUI conviction, the driver can face fines between$390 and $1,000, and prison time of 96 hours to six months, withthree to five years of probation.

Penalties increase with further violations.