The Westchester car accident

[Bertilak]

It is SCARY seeing a vehicle heading toward you on a freeway, it has happened to me.

And me. About a year ago.

Four-lane divided highway with *very* wide grassy area between N and S lanes. Heavy fog. I am driving fairly slowly in rightmost lane due to poor visibility when Wooosh! someone comes by me in the other lane going the wrong way! By the time that car registered in my brain it was almost on me and then gone behind me before I had *any* chance to react. Took me a few more seconds to even realize something wasn't right!

I can see how it happened. Someone not familiar with the road came in from a side road (there were at-grade crossings with only stop signs) and seeing only the one paved area simply turned onto it and kept the the right, little knowing he was about 50 yards short of the *real* right-hand lanes for traffic in his direction.

 

[sol92258]

It is SCARY seeing a vehicle heading toward you on a freeway, it has happened to me.

The really bad part is, there is a moment there where you are so absolutely thrown off by what you're seeing, that there is an uncomfortably long period where you do nothing. It's almost like seeing someone walk past you, upside down, on the ceiling. Fortunately, in this case I had some time to do something. I slowed down, pulled as far to the right as I could, and flashed my lights high to low, on and off. The errant driver soon realized the mistake, and since traffic was fortunately very light, was able to shoulder and turn around in the right direction.

I'll tell you, it took a while for the hairs on the back of my neck to relax after that one!

Don

And me. About a year ago.

Four-lane divided highway with *very* wide grassy area between N and S lanes. Heavy fog. I am driving fairly slowly in rightmost lane due to poor visibility when Wooosh! someone comes by me in the other lane going the wrong way! By the time that car registered in my brain it was almost on me and then gone behind me before I had *any* chance to react. Took me a few more seconds to even realize something wasn't right!

I can see how it happened. Someone not familiar with the road came in from a side road (there were at-grade crossings with only stop signs) and seeing only the one paved area simply turned onto it and kept the the right, little knowing he was about 50 yards short of the *real* right-hand lanes for traffic in his direction.

me too...similar to Robert's experience - 4 lane, large grassy island between N & S lanes, wider than the 4 lanes put together in fact, not foggy, but was about 11:00 PM, kids asleep in the back seat, wife half asleep in passenger sleep. I had been riding next to an 18 wheeler that couldn't decide what speed he wanted to drive, so right about the time I was past him, he'd speed up til I was midway to the trailer. This went on about 4-5 times, and I said "screw this", got up to 75 for about 30 seconds, slowed back to 65 with about 25 car lengths dividing us. I was still in the left hand lane, coming around a curve to the right AND over a hill - just cresting the hill was another set of headlights bearing down right on me. Thank God I got tired of that friggin' idiot in the 18 wheeler when I did, or I would've had nowhere but that large grassy area to go to, with a steep dropoff at the particular area we would have been at. I had to veer all the way to the right hand shoulder, because as I've heard it, drunks may drive toward headlights in that situation, and this fool did exactly that. Woke everyone up in the car, kids were fortunately oblivious to the whole thing, except probably thinking daddy sucks at driving, wife couldn't sleep at all that night. I had a hard time sleeping myself. What pisses me off the most was I found out the next day (after passing the moron, I saw the cops coming in the northbound lane - I was southbound), the person got off with a warning - apparantly she/her family has some kind of sway around here (can't remember who it was), and this was the second time she'd done this.
Yeah, that's very consoling to my families well-being, *******$.

so, yeah, I'm glad you and you're family are safe, and that sucks to hear for the kids with no option in that situation to get out of the vehicle, or to realize something is drastically wrong.

 

[Brodirt]

I know I started this thread and I am very chilled by the incident and what you gents above are described, but, it all brought this to mind...
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7v0eth4XAM[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Left Coast DJ]

I read the story after reading this post. There's some weird parts to this story. Hopefully the truth will come out. My wife thinks the husband spiked the woman's morning coffee and planted the vodka bottle in her vehicle.

 

[Mr. Clean]

I know I started this thread and I am very chilled by the incident and what you gents above are described, but, it all brought this to mind...
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7v0eth4XAM[/YOUTUBE]

I just put that movie into our Blockbuster queue last night, before I read your thread this morning.

I have another question. Is it just me or doesn anyone find the spelling of the last name of the victims in the other car ahem...a bit unfortunate? What would be the cultural or nationality origin of that surname?

 

[burnwood]

This is one of the many reasons I do not read or view the news that is not sports related. Bless the children.

 

[Monkeydad]

Wow. Obviously, I'm glad you and your family were not involved. I know how you feel to some degree - I live pretty close to the accident site and have driven that part of the Taconic a lot, sometimes with the kids. The whole thing has really freaked me out like few things in recent memory.

To expand on Brodirt's description for those who haven't heard, it's a really terrible story. A woman, who tunred out to be both drunk and high, was driving a minivan carrying her two children and three nieces. She drove onto an off ramp on a highway in the NYC suburbs, drove 1.7 miles going the wrong way, and collided head-on with an SUV. Everyone in her car was killed except for her five year-old son, as were three people in the minivan. There are number of weird and troubling aspects to the story in addition to the heartbreaking loss of life.

I heard about this a day or two ago. It's sad how stupid some people are. It's a shame others have to die because of her selfishness and stupidity.

It may sound terribly judgmental, but the world is better off without her. It's the loss of her kids that really upsets me. They were innocent and were taken from the world before they had the chance to achieve their potential (despite having a mother like her). Same with the other innocent family.

I don't care what she was going through personally or if a mental illness "caused" her to put the chemicals in her body, she still made the conscious choice to put peoples' lives in danger.



My wife's entire family (almost) lives on LI...thank God they weren't in her path, but prayers for the families who were.

 

[Monkeydad]

I read the story after reading this post. There's some weird parts to this story. Hopefully the truth will come out. My wife thinks the husband spiked the woman's morning coffee and planted the vodka bottle in her vehicle.

Yeah, always blame the man.

How do you not taste or smell vodka in your coffee? It's not exactly a "soft" drink. Test results said she had at least 10 ounces. Also, if it was determined she had marijuana in her system, you can't smoke it without knowing. Driving high is as bad as driving drunk, I don't care how many pro-pot people claim otherwise. It slows your functions and impairs your judgment.

Not sure I buy that theory.

 

[Kratos]

I read the story after reading this post. There's some weird parts to this story. Hopefully the truth will come out. My wife thinks the husband spiked the woman's morning coffee and planted the vodka bottle in her vehicle.

Your wife must not have all the information. How do you spike a cup of coffee with 10 ounces of vodka, on top of enough to put you at apprx .19 BAC? And with marijuana? And then drink all that without knowing? I am curious as to what comes out over the coming days. I'm quite certain there's a bit more to the story, one way or another.

 

[Brodirt]

Yeah, always blame the man.

How do you not taste or smell vodka in your coffee? It's not exactly a "soft" drink. Test results said she had at least 10 ounces. Also, if it was determined she had marijuana in her system, you can't smoke it without knowing. Driving high is as bad as driving drunk, I don't care how many pro-pot people claim otherwise. It slows your functions and impairs your judgment.

Not sure I buy that theory.

I spoke with a pro-pot person, pot smoker and father of three about this issue today. I told him that when it came out about the smoking and drinking I almost emptied my own bar and almost called him to ask him to stop smoking. His response, predictable, was it was the booze that did it...pot doesn't make you do that kind of stuff...it doesn't matter even if you mix it, the pot doesn't do it, its the booze. Yeesh, I'm no choir boy, but you wonder why when this is the mentality of the pro-pot crowd, that it doesn't get legalized.

 

[Mr. Clean]

Several mentions of the 10 oz. amount of vodka. This is what prompted my question about the length of time she was in the vehicle. Based on the one witness that said she did not have the smell of alcohol when she left the camp. How long would it take to ingest 10 oz. of alcohol?

Question for the doctors out there. Is there a bodily function which would cause an elevated blood sugar reading upon death? I seem to recall reading something about this years ago, but cannot recall the facts.

 

[Kratos]

Several mentions of the 10 oz. amount of vodka. This is what prompted my question about the length of time she was in the vehicle. Based on the one witness that said she did not have the smell of alcohol when she left the camp. How long would it take to ingest 10 oz. of alcohol? .

That all depends on you. It can be chugged PDQ. As for not smelling alcohol on her, sometimes you don't smell it on somone's breath until you are at just the right distance or angle. I have gone entire traffic stops without really smelling it, until I have them sitting in back of the car for a few minutes, when my car smells like a rolling distillery(I hate that).

 

[TorzJohnson]

Does anybody have any idea what Dominic Barbara meant when he said she had a lump on her leg that was moving? Is he trying to set up some kind of crazy sci-fi mind parasite story?

 

[Brodirt]

Does anybody have any idea what Dominic Barbara meant when he said she had a lump on her leg that was moving? Is he trying to set up some kind of crazy sci-fi mind parasite story?

He is suggesting an embolism and/or stroke. I can almost see the point if she had a stroke and had altered behavior due to the stroke that she might have pulled off and bought a bottle of Absolut...but explain the weed.

 

[HanzZ]

Its a close call and I am chilled by the whole story. I was wondering if I am alone in this regard.

I was driving on the Taconic that day before the accident as well, and was rather scared after hearing about the story. Just the realization that I could have been in the accident was enough.

 

[_JP_]

Its huge here in Westchester, obviously. Start here, http://tinyurl.com/msduhv, if want to know what happened.

Wow. OK, now I know the story.

We had a spate of wrong way drivers in my area a few years back. They were doing it on purpose as a way to commit suicide. After the first couple of them the police quickly developed methods to handle then and the cuckoos knocked it off after they found out that it didn't work.

There was also great success soon after that with the outerbelt system. Once again, a lot of accidents were cross overs. Cable barriers that were installed in the grassy medians have stopped that.