a freak and tragic accident

[BAT*21{usa}]

p.a. deer rifle season started today. this may be related to it . it may have been a deer being hunted .but it don't say for sure.
www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/10403136/detail.html

[desmo2]

Dude, that sucks. Poor bugger never knew what hit him.
We had a fatality near me a couple of years ago that was very similar. A father and son had been hunting or some such trip, and were on their way home late at night. They were in a full-sized pick up truck, with the 8-10 yr old boy asleep in the back seat (king cab, I guess). A deer came through the windshield, broke dad's neck, and landed in the back seat with the boy. The boy was unscathed (well, physically, anyway), but was covered in deer blood. I still feel for that kid, for he certainly has some serious emotional trauma.

[vinsanity]

This is a horrible story... when I was 11 (28 years ago) I had been on a night fishing trip with my dad and one of his friends. On our way home, about 5am, a deer jumped out of nowhere and hit the front edge of the truck's hood, then came up the hood and into the windshield. The A pillar stopped it from coming inside the cab, but we crashed nonetheless. None of the three of us were seriously injured, but banged up and cut pretty good. Dad's friend's truck was a total loss... it was an old truck, an early 70's Dodge. We were terribly lucky from what I was told. It all happened so fast! The funny thing is, I still watch out as best one can for things running out in front of me when driving at night. I guess I always will.

[RedRock]

bosinn said:

p.a. deer rifle season started today. ....

When I lived in OH on the OH/PA border, I deer and dove hunted in both states. The OH deer were bigger but those in PA were more plentiful, and the PA deer had more ticks. Anyway, I remember thinking the laws were very weird, in that in PA you could hunt on anyone's land unless they had no hunting/no trespassing signs posted, but in OH you had to have express advance written permission to hunt on private property, and also only shotgun was allowed in OH during deer gun season (buckshot or slug) but rifles were OK in PA but no semi-automatic rifles!

Just some related but random thoughts from RR.

[BAT*21{usa}]

i hope they catch this S.O.B and hang him him by his nades www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/10546197/detail.html

[vinsanity]

i agree... such an indiference for a life he may have been able to save should earn him a needle in the arm. Just don't ask pussy Jeb Bush to do it...

[RedRock]

bosinn said:

i hope they catch this S.O.B and hang him him by his nades www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/10546197/detail.html

vinsanity said:

i agree... such an indiference for a life he may have been able to save should earn him a needle in the arm.....

From the news article alone, we don't know how or why the crash occurred. Since the cycle rear-ended the truck, it is entirely possible the cyclist was totally at fault. We also don't know if anything could have been done by the driver for the cyclist that would have helped or could have even made a difference. Still shouldn't have left, but nonetheless......

Leaving the scene of a crash, while illegal and detestable, is not always done because someone feels guilty from causing or contributing to the crash. In my experience with these cases, there have been several interesting situations where drivers kept going:
1) Preacher from city A, going to nudie bar in city B 3 hrs away, hits pedestrian crossing street (not necessarily the driver's fault) in city B, but preacher doesn't want anyone to know where he's been or what he's been doing.
2) Vehicle runs over body lying in road, but driver doesn't want to be accused of killing person who might have already been dead and who shouldn't have been lying in road regardless.
3) Vehicle runs over body lying in road after 1 or 2 other vehicles ahead have hit/run over it (and those vehicles don't stop either), so driver doesn't want to stop to take sole/partial blame (and get sued for the death).
4) Philandering husband in part of town where he shouldn't be is involved in crash (not his fault) but doesn't want to stop (same reasoning as with the preacher).
5) Inattentive driver hits something or hears something ("I thought it was maybe a bump in road") on dark rainy night and truly doesn't know he hit pedestrian or car (usually a sideswipe or by passenger mirror or by object in back of truck bed sticking out the passenger side).
6) Driver has collision but feels threatend due to neighborhood or driver/car he hit.
7+) Driver without insurance, driver with outstanding warrant for arrest, driver without driver's license, driver with elevated blood alcohol, driver who has been up 20 hours without sleep, etc.----frequently leave the scene.

(Are any justifiable? Maybe the unsafe situation one, but for the rest, probably NO!. But you decide, and then hope you're never faced with actually having to make the decision.)

[Woody]

It's easy for me. If you are involved in a collision and are aware of it, you stop!

[vinsanity]

I agree Woody... you stop, period. To do otherwise is wrong on many levels. And in this case the bike and passenger were drug for "about 230 feet." There is no way a driver was unaware that this was taking place. The driver would have both felt the impact of the bike AND heard the sounds of the dragging bike (and likely the screaming of the bike rider.) I sincerely find it difficult to believe that the driver of the truck could have been oblivious to the incident.

[RedRock]

Let's see, about 230 feet, that sounds like a really long distance, but at 65 mph it's 95.33 feet per second or, holy smokes, 2.4 seconds, if the speed continues. And if it's city speed, say 35 mph, then it would be 4.5 seconds, if the speed continues. Come on, how long would it take just to know something is wrong, slow down, and then stop, and how far would you travel in that time, once the bike (which rear-ended the truck) got itself stuck on the truck hitch? Still not much time. Double or triple the constant-speed estimates above to allow for realizing it and slowing down and stopping, and we're still at just 8 to 15 seconds! Just a few heartbeats.

Without knowing the facts of the crash, why is that people want to hang someone whose only PROVEN wrong so far is leaving the crash scene? Why the rush to judgement?

[vinsanity]

I do not think anyone is rushing to judgement. I myself find it deplorable that a driver of any vehicle who was rear ended hard enough to link the two vehicles together could 1) make the claim that they were unaware that they were hit, and 2) leave the scene of the accident. Regardless of the few seconds it took for the drag of 230 feet to take place, the driver KNEW about it and made the conscious choice to flee. That in itself speaks to some level of responsibility on the part of the driver of the truck in my opinion.

Of course we do not know what this driver thought as he or she fled like a coward with no care for what may become of the person lying in the street. As to fault, either driver could easily be at fault for the collision. Perhaps the bike was speeding up on the rear of the truck and the driver "tapped" the brakes to tell him to back off... or maybe the biker lost control and sped into the back of a moving truck (not as likely.) To me the cause of the accident is not nearly as important as the events that transpired after the accident. I would feel exactly the same way if it were two cars or trucks involved versus a truck and a bike.

When I was 16 a truck ran my new truck off the road late one night on a back road. My passenger and I were both injured and the truck caught fire in the collision. The driver of the other truck came back, looked at us in the burning wreck, then jumped into his truck and fled the scene. Fortunately I was able to get out of the truck, pull my passsenger out, and get us to a safe distance only to watch the truck burn up while we waited for someone to come help us. I have always said that if I could find that person I would make him sorry he was born. People who display so little care for the lives of others do not deserve to live themselves.

[RedRock]

Still assuming facts not in evidence!!!

The hitch made the "hook-up" easier and does not necessarily imply a hard impact, unlike what you might expect when one car bumper hits another bumper. Furthermore, if the bike went down/sideways before or after the impact, or if the truck had stuff in the bed, it is possible the driver, who may never have even seen the bike before the collision, might not know there was a bike and rider stuck to his vehicle after the collision, either. I expect he'd have felt some vibrations and heard some scraping noise, but if the radio were on, he might not have known what it was or where it was coming from (sounds from the rear of your vehicle while you are moving are harder to assess than ones from the sides or front). And as the time involved in the "hellacious" 230 feet is so very small, it might have all gone away quickly and he thought, I just ran over some brush or metal that stuck to the undersurface of my vehicle, etc.

Again, this IS a rush to judgement. I see it all the time in my case work, but when all of the facts are known, the whole picture frequently emerges quite differently than initially presented, especially when we can divorce ourselves of the emotion of the injury and death and consider the humanity of all the people involved.

BAT, can you request the crash report on this one--it should be public documents--but it might be weeks or months before it is finalized, and then summarize the finding of the events or scan it and post it here for us to consider more fully?----if we really want to follow up on this one.

But as to stopping, ok, I agree the truck driver should have stopped, if he knew and if he felt safe.

And people, be careful! The very definition of road rage can be summed up thusly: "I'm gonna teach that other bastard some manners!"

"Can't we all just get along?"

[vinsanity]

I am not assuming anything... We know a connection was made and the driver left after dragging the biker. I DO however believe the driver would have known.

[RedRock]

Vince, sent you pm.

[BAT*21{usa}]

o.k. i can try, do you have an idea where to look. i thought the crash may be the bikers fault but with the drivers using cell phones not counting other things people do in the car{eat ,drink, read newspapers ( i actually saw a man reading one folded against the steering wheel driving down the turnpike one time as i passed him)brush their teeth(the one morning an anchor woman on WTAE-TV said she saw someone doing this on the parkway as she drove to work one morning this would be approx: 2 to 2:30 am E.S.T. as she is on the 5am newscast)} one time recently as i was sitting at a stop sign, i saw a woman coming the other way with a cigarette in one hand (not in her mouth) and a cell phone to her ear in the other hand .no hands at all on the wheel .she did a rolling stop at approx: 25 to 30 mph and proceeded past me with no hands on the wheel cause i waited and watched her. if he was on the cell phone he may not have noticed like the lady that her car was on fire and had no idea that it was even though the flames were higher than the roof of the SUV.{i put the story in a previous post}.but if that is the case it still affords him no excuse no matter who's fault the initial accident is.