Stay Safe Be Seen

Inside our road safety day with East Markham and Sutton-on-Trent Primary Schools

BRINGING THE LORRY TO THE PLAYGROUND
Picture the scene: a full size Hutchinson lorry parked up outside the school gates, with children from pre-school to Year 6 taking their turn, group by group, to find out why. That was the start of Stay Safe Be Seen, our chance to swap the classroom for the tarmac and turn road safety into something the whole school would remember.

We could have sent a leaflet home. Instead we brought the truck, the drivers and the noise, and let the children discover for themselves just how differently the world looks from behind the wheel of something this size. This is what happens when a local business rolls up its sleeves for the community it's part of.

THE ASSEMBLY
Each visit kicked off with an assembly. We introduced Hutchinson, our lorries, and the idea that started the whole day: something can look enormous from the pavement and still leave the person driving it with almost no idea a child is standing right next to it. That's the gap Stay Safe Be Seen was built to close.

DANGER ZONE, SAFE ZONE
From the hall, the children went straight outside to meet the lorry itself. Using cones, they physically stood in the areas around the vehicle where a driver simply cannot see them, what we call the Danger Zone, then moved into the spots where the driver could, the Safe Zone. Seeing it marked out on the ground, rather than being told about it, is what made it land.

THE THUMBS UP CHECK
We also taught the children to check for themselves. Before stepping anywhere near the lorry, they had to get eye contact with the driver and a big two thumbs up in return, proof the driver could actually see them. Simple, and something they can use around any big vehicle, not just ours.

LISTEN UP
Next came a listen-up session. The children learned to recognise the sounds a lorry makes and what each one means for where they should stand. Engine starting up, take a step back. Reversing beeper, stay well clear. Turning left indicator, that's the sound of the lorry swinging towards you, so they understood that the Safe Zone was on the opposite side, learning to work out which side the danger was coming from just by listening. We tested them on it, and by the end they had it down.

INSIDE THE CAB
For most of the children, this was the part they had been looking forward to all day. One by one they climbed up into the cab, wide-eyed at how high up it felt, how many mirrors and buttons there were, and just how far you could see from the driver's seat. Our driver Derek was on hand the whole time, answering everything from how fast the lorry goes to what’s the best thing you’ve transported (turns out it was a whale!), no script, no filter, just a school full of children from pre-school right up to Year 6 asking exactly what they wanted to know. Derek kept his cool the entire time, which was no small feat given how hot the cab got on one of the hottest days of the year.

THE GRAND FINALE: WATER BALLOONS
Then came the moment every single child had been waiting for. One by one, they queued up with a water balloon in hand and let it fly at the side of the lorry. The message behind it was simple. A water balloon is soft, just like we are, and a lorry is hard. When something soft meets something hard at speed, it comes off worse every time, and the balloon bursting on impact was a gentle but memorable way of making that point without ever needing to spell it out.
It was loud, it was chaotic, and it was brilliant, a proper wow moment that turned a serious safety lesson into something the whole playground was talking about at home time. If you want a single image that sums up the day, it's this one.

WHAT SAFETY MEANS TO ME
After the session, each child was tasked with drawing what safety meant to them and turning it into a poster. It's their own work, which is exactly why the winning entries deserve to go further than the classroom wall. A winner will be chosen from each year group, and the designs will be turned into vinyls and applied to the side of Hutchinson lorries, taking the children's own safety message out onto the roads of the UK for everyone to see.

WITH THANKS TO
Massive thanks to Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue, Nottinghamshire Police and British Transport Police for joining us on the day with their own individual safety sessions.

Closer to home, Ryan led the initiative and did a brilliant job as our spokesperson on the day, with Kay behind the scenes sorting the logistics and keeping everything running smoothly. Our driver Derek spent the day fielding questions from the cab with a smile, and a special mention for Dan, our MD, who served as our second driver. After a full day of jokes with the kids, we've decided the only thing missing was Dan turning up dressed as Trevor the Traffic Light Elephant.

THE MESSAGE THAT STICKS
Every activity on the day- the thumbs-up check, listening for danger, the cab, the balloons- was building towards one simple message we wanted every child to take home with them: stay safe, be seen.