Another high-speed disaster on the 400
Man killed in crash as debate renews on dangerous driving on highways
Jun 19, 2007 04:30 AM
Staff Reporter
In a crash eerily similar to one just 48 hours before, two young male drivers speeding on Highway 400 are facing serious charges in an accident that caused the death of a tanker truck driver.
The 11:30 a.m. incident in the northbound lanes of the highway near Bradford closed the highway in both directions all day.
It took place just 2 kilometres north of where a high-speed Saturday-night crash in the southbound lanes, also involving two young drivers, left 11 injured and closed the highway in both directions for 14 hours.
The strikingly similar incidents raise fresh questions about what might be done to discourage risky behaviour by young drivers and reduce the harm done, perhaps with better road engineering and technological advances.
The two male drivers, both in their early 20s, are from Mississauga and Etobicoke. One drove a black Mustang, the other a green Pontiac Grand Am, and were taking friends to Wasaga Beach on a break from final exams yesterday.
They face at least five charges each, including criminal negligence causing death, dangerous driving causing injury and bodily harm and dangerous driving by racing.
The 21-year-old male driver of a third car, a green Honda, was charged with dangerous driving. Police determined the Etobicoke man was not directly or indirectly involved in the collision and his car was some distance behind the other two when the collision occurred.
Police were withholding the name of the deceased truck driver, who was in his late 50s, until the next of kin had been notified.
The driver of a Jeep station wagon also involved in the accident was taken to hospital with minor injuries.
Several witnesses described the Mustang and Grand Am travelling at high speed and weaving in and out of lanes before the crash occurred, just south of Highway 89.
"One or more of the vehicles caused the truck driver to swerve, hitting the centre median and then careening across three lanes of traffic and into a ditch," an Ontario Provincial Police release said.
In Saturday night's crash, police laid charges of dangerous driving and criminal negligence against two drivers.
Technology could play a bigger role in discouraging the high speed involved in such events, according to road safety experts.
Sweden is already experimenting with speed limiters on car engines, said Kevin McClafferty, team manager at the University of Western Ontario Multidisciplinary Accident Research Team.
An advocate of photo radar, he also expects to see more data collected on the so-called black boxes that monitor car airbag systems.
"As that technology starts to be more widespread, maybe that will be a deterrent too. Then if (speeders) crash we're going to know how fast they were going," McClafferty said.
Newer highways, such as the 407 ETR,are designed with wide, open medians, rumble strips and wider paved shoulders. Rebuilding an older one like the 400, which dates to the 1950s, probably isn't feasible, he said. But the highway's engineering isn't the problem, said Brian Patterson, head of the Ontario Safety League and frequent 400 driver. He was skeptical of how much technology could do to reduce such incidents.
"Speed limiters will stop you speeding on the 400, but it won't stop you from driving like a bat out of hell in your own neighbourhood."
What's more, "photo radar lowers speed in its initial phases and it's an excellent safety tool for construction zones and high-risk areas, but you'd be hard-pressed to convince the public that it's not connected to a cash grab."
The drivers arrested yesterday were with friends from Toronto's Kipling Collegiate on their way to Wasaga Beach for the day, a passenger in one of the cars told the Star at the crash scene.
"We have exams (today) so we came out to chill," said Raj Chandpuri, 18, who was in the backseat of the Grand Am. A friend was one of those charged.
Chandpuri said he didn't know how the crash occurred because he was reading at the time.
Beside him was Tahir Khan, 19, who said he was trying to sleep; a third young male passenger said he'd been asleep also.
"We're feeling very bad," said Chandpuri. "We didn't realize this was going to happen ... It was an accident."
Two young women who were passengers in the Mustang said they didn't want to speak about what had happened.
Tina Hannahson, 37, of Mississauga, who was heading north in the centre lane of the highway yesterday, said the nightmare unfolded in front of her when at least three cars raced past her in the right lane.
Moments before, she had let the tanker – which police said was empty – merge in front of her from the left. "I got cut off by a Mustang," said Hannahson. "He went into the left lane and then he came around in front of the truck and cut the truck off."
On the opposite side of the highway, Jane Lennox, 40, was heading to Toronto with her 13-year-old daughter, Laura. She said she briefly stared death in the face when she saw the tanker come toward the guardrail and her vehicle.
The truck hit the guardrail and swerved back before ending up on its side in the ditch.
"I think he's a hero," Lennox said of the truck driver. "If he hadn't corrected himself, he would have hit us head-on and we would have been dead."
OPP Sgt. Cam Woolley agreed it was "probably driver action" that spared Lennox and others. Had the truck gone over into oncoming traffic, there would have been far worse carnage.
Police, he said, will treat the investigation as if it were a homicide.