jad n rich

Third accident in just over a month where a car load of kids (15 - 18) have been killed. Thats just this month, but it happens continually

Probably totally paraniod about this, having seen our eldest arrive just in time to join in the car culture. We did all the right stuff, proper training, safety course, small un powerful car, but hes known 2 friends to die the same way, and no matter how your kid drives you dont know who they are passenger with. Driving age just lowered here to learners at 16. Maybe it should have been raised.

This was last night, near the mountain creek school, most here would know it.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20781348-2,00.html

Nicstids

It's exactly the same here in Toowoomba - this was the headline in today's local paper

http://www.thechronicle.com.au/local...ondsubsection=

Our son is only 11 but it's still a worry for us

moneypenny20

My eldest is still only 14 so hopefully a while to go, but I thought they QLD gov, had made the driving regs stronger to stop this sort of thing - obviously wrong

jad n rich

We have 3 sons. The youngest 2 saw the site of this crash, we were dropping one off at a sleepover just off that street, its a 13th birthday, was thinking in 3 years it wont be sleepovers it will be cars, makes me feel sick.

jad n rich

It was 16/half for learners with test on 17th. Now its going to be learners on 16th with test on 17th so they get more time on learners. Due to the amount of car loads getting killed in such a horrific way they were going to restrict passengers, dont know if that was approved in QLD, I know NSW decided against it.


Theres loads they could do, learners later, only allowing small cars, I dont know what anybody is thinking letting kids with hormones and 6 months of driving experience in big powerful cars, insist on driving school training, when J learnt most of his mates only had one or two lessons prior to test. Limit pasengers, roadworth cars ! insurance for them is horrendous, so most get old bombs that should probably be off the road. Education in schools, maybe some shock tactics, pictures of wrecks, would most teen boys care tho, many wouldn't. Shouldnt keep saying boys, they are the most common but plenty of girls been killed too, passengers in this one were 15.

northerner

Not sure driving age has much to do with it TBH. Kids will be kids will do stupid things will drive cars too fast with car full of mates will drink too much will take drugs (although not necessarily in that order).

I heard that the drink limit for newly passed drivers is zero which is a very good thing. Not suggesting that the accident was due to drink - probably a car full of mates egging driver on, full of confidence, I'm king of the world etc., etc., etc.....

The thing that used to piss me off more than anything is parents who buy their 14 year old kids mini motos. Now why the hell would a parent do that???! Used to see them carving up the streets all the time with no helmet of course. Can only leed to them wanting to drive/ride bike earlier, gives them false sense of invincibility etc.

Shame though.

Graham

moneypenny20

I really don't get the parents though. Until this week when year 12's left, you couldn't park outside the high school for the year 12's parking there and all of them in huge family v8's, 4x4s and more often than not, no passengers. Why are they driving such huge cars to school where it's going to sit all day - whar are the parents driving?

It's quite intimidating when I am in my Toyota Corolla (I know, I'm sorry), and trying to reverse out with these enormous things being driven by kids, oblivious to other cars all over the place.

BadgeIsBack

It's always the kids.

It's not even the power of the cars, you can still crash in a 1.1 Fiesta. I remember my mother being concerned that my first car was 'big' - a Ford Sierra(!) Her partner told her that in a crash, you're safer in a big car.

It's more a combination of high spirits, inexperience (judgement), fatigue, overcrowding and alcohol - in my opinion - and often the driver will not necessarily have been drinking.

I have now attended 6 crashes on 2 major arterial routes, 2 deaths, 1 intensive care and several hositalisations including the partner of one of the policeman who turns up at most of our incidents who we are on nodding terms with.

There have also been stacks of what we call washaways; crashes or leaks which might cause one. We got to one to find a car on its roof, with a shaken security guard who had crawled out of it. It's amazing the state of the cars.

About a year ago, I attended a fatality. When we arrived on scene, I was first to the car, and a blood splattered arm grabbed my structural jacket and tried to pull me towards him in a panic. It didn't take us long to realise that the driver was deceased. One of the firies didn't feel too good so I was left on my own, standing in front of a dead boy who looked no older than 16 without a mark on him holding a hose in case the car caught fire. They cut him out so as to get to his still alive mates. He was in the way so they left him by the side of the road - which also upset one of the firies. His mate was in a bad way, and died soon after. The third one would not stop screaming.

I spent the next 24 hours driving around looking in all my mirrors and seeing the dead boy's face everywhere I looked. I can still see it even now.

I've also seen a woman trapped under her dashboard with her kids sitting by the side of the road. My wife drove past and called me on her mobile to respond. You can't help but raise your eyebrows at it all and they can see the alarm in your eyes. A young girl narrowly missing a tree but trapped under a collapsed windscreen. Often its the passengers that cop it, the driver saves themselves. What makes me feel bad is that my first response has to be to get a line out and make the scene safe, you've got a rellie or a partner trying to grab you as you get out of the tanker; they're beside themselves, and all the personal possessions are scattered all over the road.

I think you need to tell these new drivers what it looks like in these situations, at 5am in the dusk, those mickey mouse adverts on TV with plastic looking models are just not real enough - just like the one on TV now.

Sorry to be detailed, but it bugs me that its just not rammed home hard enough. I feel priveleged to be able to help these people, it's the only way it is made easier, even constructive.

steandleigh

An accident here also on friday evening - sorry don't have the link)

but front page of Cairns post - 6 kids (boys and girls 16 - 18) in one car - all now in a serious condition - also a picture of the empty alcohol cans and bottles found in the car...

Who knows what the answer is...to my mind, doesn't really matter how much you educate your kids, peer pressure will take over at some point...monitor who their friends are maybe? Make the friends welcome in your home...let them know your values...buy a small engined vehicle...lobby govt and your local MP for higher drinking age and higher driving age...who knows...

It's got to be a whole community issue, getting together and rallying around, me thinks...trouble is, theres too many 'working' parents these days who don't spend time with their kids so throw money at them to make up for the lack of parental care...hence the big vehicles, cash to spend on alcohol, lack of parental guidance and control etc etc

I'm afraid theres no easy answer and we probably won't win...

jad n rich

You can kill yourself on a pushbike, but look at the cars of the kids who get killed or speed up and down the beachfront, in the ego of a 17 year old male does a sensible small boring white toyota echo rev the ego like a V8 holden.

BadgeIsBack

Alot of people don't realise how quickly they can come unstuck in a car at any time. If you've never come unstuck you may not know the limit of your car, and you may be on the speed limit.

I stacked a car about 8 years ago and to this day I take all roundabouts at a snail's pace - but I don't care - it took me a year to pay for the new car and it won't happen again(!) So driver education, the cheaper alternative -

but, teach kids how to drive properly with advanced courses and we'll know some of the boys will enjoy it too much...

Penny, my neighbours' boys are real party animal drivers, one is 21 but still shreds and burns his tyres down our lane. I've felt the inside of his tyres and they are shocking. He is precisely the demographic of a man waiting for trouble..

His parents are also party animals and show much of an example.

BadgeIsBack

It pisses me off. Just seen the 'shocking' footage of VIC drivers in another advert. (Sat night eh?) They all look too ridiculous, some are smiling too much, it's almost comical. You can't see the fear.

It just doesn't work you people that make commercials(!)

BadgeIsBack

True. Have to say, most of the crashes I have been to have not involved a 6 or a 8. Just a car even a silly little Barina. It's the turns that seem to get them ultimately. We also have a dodgy piece of road which is disastrous in the wet, if we get more than 5mm of rain, I get my gear out and put on my boots - you know it's going to happen to an out of town driver. If its a wet Sat night, first in a while, I might go to bed clothed and keep my pager under the pillow.

spalen

I doubt that anything has changed from when we first got our licences (mine was 16 yrs ago ) and the look on our parents faces when they let us go out on a friday night with a car full of mates.

I had 3 mates killed in a crash at 18, they hit a tree, the only thing I took from that was if you are skidding dont head for trees. I wrote off a volvo on a wet roundabout on a motorway exit and since walking away from a mangled wreck with nothing more than a headache Ive chosen my cars on their Euro NCap rating. THe one thing I will do for my kids when they are old enough to drive is buy them a whatever the equivelant is of a 5* NCAP hover car.

that doesnt stop them getting in their mates crappy unsafe cars, just like it doesnt stop them sleeping over at mates houses now, playing in the park on their own unsupervised (at mates houses) , and all the other dangers that kids go through growing up.

As for these ********* who buy their kids quad or mini-motes they should be arrested for child abuse, unless they own acreage and have full crash helmets. If I put my kids in a position of significant harm neglectfully Id expect to feel the long arm of the law (or at least the disdain of society), why these are allowed is beyond me.

When you are young you do dumb things. When you get older you hit middle age any buy a motorbike and do dumb things.

(oh my god im turning into victor meldrew, Im only 36, help! )

BadgeIsBack

I inspected a mini-moke today advertised for sale. From the driveway it looked like a proper motorbike lol. I agree, all fine for acreage kids and chasing chooks but iffy elsewhere.

I also had a 18 year major accident to read in the UK press. But I remember, it did not effect me then, I was too young, we were more touched by the fact we wouldn't see them again, not the tragedy or that it happens to everyone. There's no doubt you get more aware of your mortality as you get older. I would never do another low level parachute jump. I just don't fancy it.

I've just done a proper review of all our recent accidents, going back through my attendance records, and the majority of them, by a whisker, are girls, on their own, in little cars, can you believe. Only 1 car with all-boys and that was a mid size Honda. Drugs may have been involved, if not alcohol. The rest are equally shared between middle age men and women.