"Stop me before I kill again!"
Posted on 11/24/2005 5:43:29 AM PST by devane617
Her license was taken, then given back. We all got together and talked her into using the senior-service bus and she never drove again.
This was a good-ending... unlike so many others.
I'm actually surprised there aren't more "Speed Bump" accidents from the land of retirees.
At 77, the poor woman probably has the awareness, reaction and reflexes of a Friday night drunk.
I'm shocked this isn't being blamed on the car, like the fictional "sudden accelerations" of Audis in the 1980s.
Some folks at 77 are brighter than a lot of 21 year olds.
It doesn't mention it in the article, but these ladies lived in the same subdivision (Mainlands) as the elderly man who hit the guy and kept on driving toward the Skyway Bridge with the man lodged in his windshield.
Well, it was a Toyota Station Wagon. That's not a violent breed. Had she been driving an SUV, the article would certainly have been written differently.
There is blame enough to go around. One should never stand directly behind or in front of the car one is directing.
But they can't drive worth a damn.
I say with full confidence that most 77 year olds are brighter than most 21 year olds. Reaction times are a different story.
"Stop me before I kill again!"
My grandmother continued to drive until she broke her pelvis and was placed in a home. She was frankly blind and drove anyway. She somehow conned the DMV into renewing her drivers license. How exactly I'm not sure. But she had absolutely no business being on the road, and was a menace to every living thing. I'm told she would tool along at about 20 mph. The only good news was that if she hit someone they had a good long time to get out of the way.
I can sympathize though. Driving is a sign of independence and it is tought to give it up.
The law firm of Dewey, Cheatum and Howe is on the case and will be contacting Toyota.
We "white knuckled" the trip to the airport and she crossed 4 lanes of traffic to barely make it off at the exit.
Needless to say we counted our blessings to be alive.
Sadly NO-ONE could convince her to give up her license!
I fear it will end badly!
It's no small deal when your days grow short.
My partner's elderly aunt did the same thing against an even more elederly 95 year old grandmother. Broke the grandma's hip.
Why is it always two ladies?
LOL!!
Oh, for Pete's sake....
These really are tragic. Oldsters who have driven safely for decades, and can't imagine having lost the capacity to drive safely indefinitely. Trouble is, it is probably more inattentiveness or distractibilty, which wouldn't show up during a driving test. I know alcohol also contributes to a percentage of these cases, and to a small undetermined degree, perhaps medications.
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