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Federal Government Recommends Lower DUI Limits on Anniversary of Deadly Kentucky Crash

On the 25th anniversary of the nation's deadliest drunk driving crash, federal safety officials are pushing for tougher DUI laws. 

The National Transportation Safety Board is recommending that states lower the benchmark for determining when a driver is intoxicated.  NTSB chair Deborah Hersman says hundreds of lives could be saved each year by lowering the blood alcohol level.

"We can choose to accept the senseless and needless losses or we choose to act," Hersman remarks.

The NTSB is also pushing for stiffer drunk driving penalties, including laws requiring first-time offenders to have ignition locking devices. 

The NTSB recommendations come 25 years after a drunk driver travelling on the wrong side  of I-71 in Carrollton, Kentucky slammed head-on into a bus carrying passengers home from a church youth trip.  Twenty-seven people died, 24 of them children.