Astounding crash in Kaneohe

[LikaNui]

I assume many of you saw this mind-boggling story on the news today.
A 4am crash in Wilson Tunnel, Kaneohe bound. Three young people died; two of them employees at Haleiwa Joe's (which is closed tonight). Estimates are that the car was going between 100 and 120mph. If there was ever a chance to show kids the dangers of speeding, this is clearly it.
Here's the first of Richard Ambo's amazing photos. It doesn't even look like a car; it looks like a truck spilled a load of miscellaneous scrap metal:



Here's the wreckage being hauled away:

Only in this photo does it vaguely resemble what was once a vehicle:






As I said, force your children to look at this. SPEED KILLS.

[tutusue]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

According to one news account I heard, the one car crash began outside the tunnel and ended inside the tunnel. Evidently, other Haleiwa Joe's employees were first on the scene. I wonder if they were returning from a pau hana get together. Such a tragic, unnecessary, reckless...mess.

[cyleet99]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Done, Lika...thanks for the pictures. DS and I have had the talk for now.

Years ago there was a slide presentation that nurses from our ED in SC used to give. EN CARE was an organization started by a couple of ED RNs from Massachusetts who were tired of seeing lots of drunk driving deaths and injuries. Their presentation was about an hour long, and the presentation included pictures like those with followup of info about the victims and families (all okayed by the families, of course) all focused on prevention of drunk driving. The organization lasted for about 10 years, and grew big enough to get the attention of the national Emergency Nurses Association, who promptly swallowed it up and added all sorts of other "Injury Prevention" topics to it.

My prayers to the families of the victims, and to the EMS/fire/police at the scene of that crash and of the one on Farrington tonight that turned into another fatality. Four traffic deaths in one day....

[LikaNui]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

According to one news account I heard, the one car crash began outside the tunnel and ended inside the tunnel.

Apparently they ran up on the embankment outside the tunnel on the right hand side, flipped over, flew through the air and hit the barrier that you see in that first photo (See the light pole? Right next to it is the base of another pole, which the car demolished.) and slid into the tunnel after bouncing off the walls.
I heard that the investigators found no sign that the guy tried to brake at all.

Evidently, other Haleiwa Joe's employees were first on the scene. I wonder if they were returning from a pau hana get together.

They'd been at a birthday party, apparently. No answer yet on whether alcohol or drugs were involved.

Done, Lika...thanks for the pictures. DS and I have had the talk for now.

Excellent!!!

Their presentation was about an hour long, and the presentation included pictures like those with followup of info about the victims and families (all okayed by the families, of course) all focused on prevention of drunk driving.

Pictures are good, of course. But I'm a believer in taking kids to an emergency room to see what can happen. When I was a teenager and wanted to buy a motorcycle, my parents insisted that I first volunteer to work in an ER for two weeks, and it made me the most defensive rider in history.
I had a hot car or two back in the day and of course did some speeding, but thankfully it was mostly on a racetrack.
I feel sorry for the emergency folks who had to respond to that accident this morning. No matter how often you deal with accidents, having to remove three bodies with, pretty much, a pair of tweezers is a guarantee of nightmares.

[MyopicJoe]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Maybe it's because I've never had a loved one die in a car accident, witness a grieving family, or seen bodies broken (*knock on wood*); but I have some non-PC thoughts on the issue. I'll self-censor myself for the most part.

Who knows what went on inside of the car, minutes before the accident. Their families won't know. Unanswered questions left to be filled with angry thoughts. It'll be one of many wounds inflicted on the three families. It may lead to more "blood" if the families of the passengers blame the driver (who may be the only one at fault or not).

At least they didn't kill any innocents.

[tutusue]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

[...]
At least they didn't kill any innocents.

We'll never know that, either.

[oceanpacific]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Anyone remember the accident on the H-1 a number of years ago near Kahala Mall? A 19-year-old careened over the side barrier and landed on the pavement of the Chevron station below. His car, an Acura Integra, broke in half upon impact. The kid was killed. It was alleged, but never proved, that racing was involved. What a tragic waste.

The demolished vehicle was there for a week or so as a silent monument. One father said that he took his son to see the wreck to impress on him the possible consequences of reckless driving.

I was shocked to learn that my sister knew the victim's family and that she was asked by his parents to plan the memorial service.

[Composite 2992]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

In my 24 years as a news photographer I saw and heard my share of people trapped, crushed and shredded in bad accidents. You'd be amazed at the kinds of horrible sounds a human can make when they're in EXTREME pain. And how helpless you can feel when a truck is slowly crushing someone to death right before your eyes -- and you can't do a damn thing about it. That guy did something heroic, driving up an embankment off the Pali highway when the brakes failed. But got caught when he attempted to jump from the cab as the truck rolled over. He should have stayed in his seatbelts.

So it really ticks me off when people continue to drive carelessly or recklessly. I'd like to see excessive speeding turned into a felony, on par with someone standing on the road shooting a rifle at random. Put these guys in prison for ten years. No parole. The lives saved could be my own family members.

People just have no appreciation for how much mayhem a speeding vehicle can do. A motorcycle going 100 can kill a carload of innocent people if it rear-ends a car on the freeway. At 100 MPH it's a deadly projectile. That happened under the Nimitz overpass recently. The motorcyclist and the car's driver were killed.

And there's the psychological injuries these people inflict when bystanders happen to witness a human being butchered by twisting metal. Drunk driving is bad enough. It's time to outlaw dumb driving.

[Amati]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

It's time to outlaw dumb driving.

Chances are, if someone does something really dumb while driving they ARE breaking a law that is already in place. Except for texting while driving, that dumbness is not against the law. Yet.

[GeckoGeek]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Who knows what went on inside of the car, minutes before the accident.

Maybe. But I'll bet I know part of what was going though the driver's mind. The driver thinks speed is fun, and it's all controllable. What they don't realize is just how unstable everything becomes at that speed. A curve which is normally completely benign and of no consequence becomes the place where the car ceases to become a controlled vehicle and becomes a projectile. I don't know as it's something you realize until you've driven a car to the edge of it's control. Until that point, loss of control is what happens to others.

I'd like to see excessive speeding turned into a felony, on par with someone standing on the road shooting a rifle at random. Put these guys in prison for ten years. No parole. The lives saved could be my own family members.

And the bill for Speed Cameras, which was only for ticketing excessive speeding, died this session.

[surlygirly]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

But I'll bet I know part of what was going though the driver's mind. The driver thinks speed is fun, and it's all controllable.

And there's nothing scarier than being in the passenger in a car with a driver like that who won't slow down, no matter how much the other people in the car are screaming at him. The driver thinks he's in control. The passengers KNOW they're not; they're at the mercy of someone on a power trip. And it's not like you can just get out of the car at 135 mph. All you can do is keep begging the driver to slow down and pray really hard that you don't hit anything.

Or, like my smartest friend did, call 911 from the backseat.

[scrivener]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

The speed limits on most roads are calculated by engineers, as one of the guys said on the news. I don't know what kind of buffer zone is added to the numbers (taking human tendencies into consideration), but if a road can handle 35 MPH and you're going 45, that's excessive speeding, friend.

It's still true that people will drive as quickly as they feel safe. The limit in my neighborhood is 25, but almost nobody ever drives that fast because with the cars lined up on both sides and visibility not much more than 15 feet, you'd have to be a nut to go faster than 15.

I say all this to remind anyone pointing the finger of judgment (which in this case I think is rightfully pointed) that if you go 45 on that same stretch of road, YOU are speeding excessively and you could be next. If you were opposed to the TaliVans but are in favor of speed limits, I will also call you a hypocrite.

[GeckoGeek]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

but if a road can handle 35 MPH and you're going 45, that's excessive speeding, friend.

Some say possession is 9/10th of the law. I don't know about that, but definitions is very much a part of the law. The legal definition of excessive speeding is 30 MPH over or more than 80MPH.

What you've described, 45 in a 35 zone, is just speeding. (Or depending on what part of the road we're talking about, keeping up with traffic. )

[LikaNui]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Anyone remember the accident on the H-1 a number of years ago near Kahala Mall? A 19-year-old careened over the side barrier and landed on the pavement of the Chevron station below.

I remember it. It was about a dozen years ago, and I happened upon the scene just an hour or so after the accident, when I pulled into that Chevron station to get gas and saw the remains of the car.

[MyopicJoe]

Re: Astounding crash in Kaneohe

Star Bulletin has a story about the driver. History of 6 speeding tickets. Grrr.

Driving is NOT a video game. Grow up from your teenage fantasies and get a life. Sorry Audi driver, yours is all pau.

In a video game, you traditionally have 3 lives. Ironic.