East Sussex Police live tweeting during Friday drink drive checks

The exact location of the checks is not being disclosed. However throughout December, roadside checks are carried out across Sussex and on Friday night web users can follow one of these taking place in East Sussex live on Twitter and Facebook as part of the Drink Drive - Tweet Live event.

Twitter users can follow @roadpol_east and use #drinkdrive from 9.30pm to find out what is happening at the checks, ask questions about drink driving and see pictures. Facebook users can keep in touch via the ‘East Sussex Road Policing Unit’ Facebook page.

Inspector Phil Duffy said: “These drink drive checks are part of routine business for us during December, but we are always looking for new ways to keep the public informed about what we are doing to keep the county’s roads safe.

“In this instance, our efforts to find inventive ways to engage with the public has been noticed by other roads policing teams from around the UK, some of whom will also be ‘live’ tweeting from their own checks at the same time. This should give a national view of the work of road policing officers during a drink drive check, and give a behind-the-scenes view of what happens during our checks in Sussex.”

The drink drive check on Friday is being supported by East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service who will be providing advice to drivers about the dangers of drink driving and some of their first-hand experience of dealing with collisions involving drink drivers.

Inspector Duffy said: “In the emergency services environment we regrettably deal with the collisions that can be caused by drink or drugged drivers and hope that the message to either drink or drive will be taken up. I would encourage anyone with information about drink drivers in Sussex to text our drink drive text number on 65999 with the three Ws, What registration number, Where it is, and When it’s likely to be driven.”

Two people have been arrested since December 1 as a result of people sending texts to Sussex Police about suspected drink drivers.

Road users in Sussex can text officers on 65999 with details about people they suspect of drink driving.

Since the annual Christmas drink drive campaign started on December 1, around 30 texts have been received, so far resulting in two arrests.

Chief Inspector Phil Nicholas of Sussex Police’s Road Policing Unit said: “The text number is a great way for people to contact the police if they do not feel comfortable phoning through the information.

“From the texts we have gathered some really good intelligence about people who are thought to regularly drink drive and also information about people are believed to be, or about to be, drink driving at the time the text was sent.”

As well as reporting by text information can also be passed to police by calling 101, visiting www.operationcrackdown.org or in an emergency call 999.

Until this Wednesday, 1,836 breath tests had been carried out in the county with 55 people failing, resulting in arrest.