Driver,80, seen veering across road before killing cyclist

Sniffer wrote:

don simon wrote:

Sniffer wrote:

John Smith wrote:

I’m always ready to criticise poor driving and poor sentencing, but honestly, this seems reasonable. She had a medical episode, out of the blue, and unfortunately someone died. It wasn’t intentional, it wasn’t entirely foreseeable and she has done the right thing showing remorse and giving up her driving licence. Whilst it is tragic that someone died this was not malicious and without the benefit of hindsight it’s difficult to see what could have been done to prevent it.

If you believe there were no other episodes prior to this one while not driving. Maybe, maybe not.

Are you suggesting that she didn't have a first episode?

I have no idea, but I was surprised that the assertion by her lawyer was taken on so easily by other commenters. People often don't accept signals when they don't like the consequences. Maybe I just don't believe everything I read.

*cough* *cough* ... Glasgow bin lorry incident *cough* *cough*...

John Smith wrote:

I’m always ready to criticise poor driving and poor sentencing, but honestly, this seems reasonable. She had a medical episode, out of the blue, and unfortunately someone died. It wasn’t intentional, it wasn’t entirely foreseeable and she has done the right thing showing remorse and giving up her driving licence. Whilst it is tragic that someone died this was not malicious and without the benefit of hindsight it’s difficult to see what could have been done to prevent it.

To prevent it you have regular driving tests at least for those over 65.  As someone else mentioned thats how aviation works.  Driving a car appears to be potentially just as hazardous as flying a light arircraft.

wellsprop wrote:

This isn't right.

Something needs to be done to hold drivers accountable for driving when they are clearly not capable of doing so - regardless of their age.

I'm outstanded there is no compulsory periodical retesting of older (hell, why not all) drivers. It's well known that as you age, you lose the ability to react etc. The aviation community has recurrent testing and, indeed, there are many older and very skilled pilots still flying.

My grandfather crashed his car, writing it off; a couple months later he wrote off a second car. Only then did he go to the doctors and found out he had medical problems which meant he shouldn't be driving.

All it would take is making it compulsory to visit the GP every 5 years and get your GP to sign you off as fit enough to drive - something similar is done to fly gliders microlights.

The government are complicit in deaths and serious injuries by not applying simple rules that could weed out those not physically fit to drive, they could go a step further and actually put in a set of rules to disuade people from driving recklessly, oh wait we have those but the system isn't keen on enforcing them.

don't hold your breath that anything meaningful will change, I mean under the EU we've lowered the sight test which is too simplistic in any case.

BehindTheBikesheds wrote:

wellsprop wrote:

This isn't right.

Something needs to be done to hold drivers accountable for driving when they are clearly not capable of doing so - regardless of their age.

I'm outstanded there is no compulsory periodical retesting of older (hell, why not all) drivers. It's well known that as you age, you lose the ability to react etc. The aviation community has recurrent testing and, indeed, there are many older and very skilled pilots still flying.

My grandfather crashed his car, writing it off; a couple months later he wrote off a second car. Only then did he go to the doctors and found out he had medical problems which meant he shouldn't be driving.

All it would take is making it compulsory to visit the GP every 5 years and get your GP to sign you off as fit enough to drive - something similar is done to fly gliders microlights.

The government are complicit in deaths and serious injuries by not applying simple rules that could weed out those not physically fit to drive, they could go a step further and actually put in a set of rules to disuade people from driving recklessly, oh wait we have those but the system isn't keen on enforcing them.

don't hold your breath that anything meaningful will change, I mean under the EU we've lowered the sight test which is too simplistic in any case.

A proper public transport system would make it easier for people to give up driving, and less stressful for families and GPs to persuade them to do so.

wellsprop wrote:

This isn't right.

Something needs to be done to hold drivers accountable for driving when they are clearly not capable of doing so - regardless of their age.

I'm outstanded there is no compulsory periodical retesting of older (hell, why not all) drivers. It's well known that as you age, you lose the ability to react etc. The aviation community has recurrent testing and, indeed, there are many older and very skilled pilots still flying.

It took me a while to work out what "outstanded" was supposed to mean, should it have been "astounded"?

As to compulsory retests for older people, if introduced it should be at the age that drivers have the same number of accidents as 17 year olds. After all, that's the minimum standard of driving expected at the beginning of a driving career, a higher standard shouldn't be expected at the end.

FrankH wrote:

wellsprop wrote:

This isn't right.

Something needs to be done to hold drivers accountable for driving when they are clearly not capable of doing so - regardless of their age.

I'm outstanded there is no compulsory periodical retesting of older (hell, why not all) drivers. It's well known that as you age, you lose the ability to react etc. The aviation community has recurrent testing and, indeed, there are many older and very skilled pilots still flying.

It took me a while to work out what "outstanded" was supposed to mean, should it have been "astounded"?

As to compulsory retests for older people, if introduced it should be at the age that drivers have the same number of accidents as 17 year olds. After all, that's the minimum standard of driving expected at the beginning of a driving career, a higher standard shouldn't be expected at the end.

I thought something didn't read correctly, couldn't put my finger on it! Corrected.