With the summer weather rolling in, many of us will be blasting our car's air conditioning to keep us cool amid rising temperatures.
However, motorists are being warned about an air conditioning rule that could land them with a £5,000 fine.
In order to avoid drowsiness, Highway Code Rule 237 states that road users must keep their vehicles 'well ventilated'.
If a driver ignores this guidance and lose control of their car, they could be hit with a £5,000 in the most serious circumstances, Birmingham Live reports.
According to the government: “Many of the rules in the Code are legal requirements, and if you disobey these rules you are committing a criminal offence.
"You may be fined, given penalty points on your licence or be disqualified from driving. In the most serious cases you may be sent to prison.”
Although the Highway Code alone is not the law, many of its instructions have legal muscle behind them.
Road users who ignore the guidelines could be punished with traffic offences so it is important that you are aware of them.
It comes as the UK heads into May, with the temperatures set to rise this summer and the promise of a heatwave at some stage.
The Met Office said it was increasing heatwave temperature thresholds in eight counties before the summer. The change reflected “an undeniable warming trend” for the UK that had made the original thresholds obsolete.
“A scientific study by the Met Office into the summer 2018 heatwave in the UK showed that it was 30 times more likely to occur now than in 1750 because of the higher concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,” the Met Office said.
“As greenhouse gas concentrations increase, heatwaves of similar intensity are projected to become even more frequent, perhaps occurring as regularly as every other year.”
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