Cellphone companies unite against texting while driving

Four cellphone companies teamed up with documentary director Werner Herzog to produce a 35-minute public service announcement about texting while driving.

AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile are credited with presenting “From One Second To The Next.” The documentary has already cleared 60,000 views on YouTube and has been live on ItCanWait.com since Thursday.

Herzog’s film tells four stories about people who were involved in car accidents due to texting while driving. In some cases, the stories are told from the perspective of the victims and their families. In others, the drivers who caused the accident talk.

“For anybody out there who has a cellphone, focus while you’re driving. Pay attention while you’re driving,” said Chandler Gerber, a man from the documentary who hit an Amish family with his car while he was looking at his phone.

The piece will be distributed to more than 40,000 high schools and various government agencies, according to the Associated Press.

“I knew I could do it because it has to do with catastrophic events invading a family,” Herzog said in an AP interview. “In one second, entire lives are either wiped out or changed forever. That kind of emotional resonance is something that I knew I could cover.”