Anything unrestrained inside your vehicle can wound or kill you in a crash, but there is perhaps nothing sader than a beloved pet being the instrument of death or destruction.
Yet that's the potential reality of a dog or a cat in the back of a car or SUV or minivan without a restraining device during a crash. Thanks to the wonders of physics, in a 50 kmh impact a 60-pound dog would strike a human occupant or the windshield with the force of 1200 pounds.
That will almost certainly kill the dog and possibly the human as well.
The math is less deadly for a smaller animal, but almost certainly the animal will die even if the human doesn't.
As it happens, there are ways to restrain animals in a vehicle and save them from being a danger to themselves and the humans in the vehicle with them.
According to the American Pet Products Association (APPMA), more than 40 million pets are expected to take to the North American roads this summer without proper restraint.
While it's undeniably true that the APPMA stands to gain directly from a reversal of this trend, there's also no denying the reality of the danger posed by unrestrained animals.
So, there should be no snickering at the notion of the "Be Sure to Secure" travel safety campaign that the APPMA has launched, which has at least resulted in you reading this story.