Crash into Tutoring Center Injures Several

Photo: Orange County Register

"Firefighters extricated two victims trapped underneath the (2011 Buick sedan), including a 32-year-old man who was transported to the hospital with life-threatening injuries," the Associated Press reported.

The crash occurred today at the Tutoring Club in Fountain Valley, California. Others injured included two 15-year-old boys and a 67-year-old woman, plus the 76-year-old driver. No word yet on the cause, according to CBSLA.com.

You Mean Vodka Burns?

Photo: Chicago Sun-Times

A crash last week in Highland Park, Illinois, revealed a hazard I hadn't considered before. Usually, I'd be focused on someone getting hurt due to direct impact with a vehicle as it crashes into a building. In this instance, the lurking threat came from what was stored inside.

Binny's Beverage Depot was stocked full of vodka, gin and similar products when a woman crashed her BMW through a display window, igniting a fire in the process. A Binny's employee reportedly rescued the driver from her burning car.

“We all heard the impact and the fire started immediately,” the store manager told the Chicago Sun-Times. “It was extremely intense and there was a lot of smoke.”

Highland Park Fire Chief Patrick Tanner credited the store's fire sprinklers for preventing an even bigger tragedy. “It’s a great testimony to the sprinkler system here because there were 100 boxes of alcohol she hit,” he told the paper. “That could really get going (on fire).”

WLS-TV reported that the 84-year-old driver 'was behind the wheel of her BMW, winding her way through the parking lot...when she lost control, jumping a curb and crashing into the [store].'

Chicago Sun-Times video link | WLS-TV video link

The Importance of Staying Alert

A seeing-eye dog-in-training heard something coming...and the human trainer looked around just in time to push his blind client and the dog around the corner before a confused 93-year-old driver came down the same sidewalk in reverse earlier this month. Thanks to Beverly Hill of the law firm Abbey, Weitzenberg, Warren & Emery for this link to the KGO-TV video.

Images: KGO-TV

Farmers Insurance Employee Killed in Office Crash

Photo: Mark Harrison / © The Seattle Times

Tragedy struck in Renton, Wash., last month when an 80-year-old driver crashed her car into a Farmers Insurance office, pinning office manager Kaye Hall. First responders were unable to revive her.

Note the yellow-striped wheel stop (aka 'bumper stop') at the head of the parking space in this Seattle Times photo of the accident scene. As parking design experts have told me in the past, wheel stops don't actually stop or prevent a vehicle from moving forward. While the devices might serve as a guide for cautious drivers slowly inching forward toward the head of the parking space, bumper stops can serve to launch a vehicle up and forward if the driver hasn't come to a full stop.

Note also the nose-in (aka 'front-in') parking configuration. With no effective barriers/bollards between the parking spaces and the building, the people occupying those offices are sitting ducks for another crash of this type.

According to news reports, this accident was under investigation and no charges against the driver were announced ahead of its conclusion.

Sources:

• Seattle Times
• Renton Patch
• Renton Reporter

NPR Story: 'When to Hang Up the Keys'

NPR featured a compelling piece this morning about driving as we age: When Should Seniors Hang Up The Car Keys? A doctor interviewed in the segment suggests developing an 'advance driving directive' to make the decision, and the conversation, easier.

(Photo: NPR – Martin Novak/iStockphoto.com)

100-Year-Old Driver Backs into Crowd

Photo: AP via Daily Mail

A 100-year-old driver accidentally hit 11 pedestrians on a Los Angeles sidewalk August 29, 2012, apparently while trying to back out of a parking space. Nine of the victims were children. Some were trapped under the car, according to news accounts.

News links: Daily Mail | San Francisco Chronicle

Follow-ups: Car examined (L.A. Times) | He'll stop driving (L.A. Times)

Thanks to Marc Silverstein of Rockville, Maryland-based On The Marc Media and Beverly Hill of Abbey, Weitzenberg, Warren & Emery law firm in Santa Rosa, California, for the heads-up to this story.

[KTLA video]

Young & Old Alike Cause Crashes

Photo: WWBT NBC12

A 13-year-old girl driving in a grocery store parking lot (while accompanied by an adult) struck a 25-year-old pedestrian, then crashed into the store's entrance. The accident occurred July 22, 2012, in Comstock, Michigan.

In Ashland, Virginia, an 81-year-old driver plowed into a restaurant on July 13. Luckily, the restaurant was closed that day. Bystanders said had it been open, people very likely would have been sitting right where the car came crashing in (photo above left).

Photo: WWBT NBC12

In nearby Henrico, Virginia, two people were hurt on July 9 — one with life-threatening injuries — when a driver crashed into a dialysis center (photo below right).

Both the 13-year-old and the 81-year-old drivers reportedly confused their pedals, hitting the gas instead of the brake.

Five Injured in Dunkin Donuts Crash

A driver described as an 'elderly woman' accelerated while pulling into a parking spot in front of a Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Dunkin' Donuts and crashed through the entrance today, injuring five people, according to LehighValleyLive. The driver's car came to a rest inside the shop in front of the cash registers.

While the injuries from this crash were reportedly not deemed serious, LehighValleyLive noted that two fatal vehicle-into-building crashes had occurred in the area:

• "On Nov. 21, 2006, a 59-year-old woman was killed when a car crashed into the front of an Allentown jewelry store. Joan E. Zamborsky, of the 900 block of North St. Lucas Street, Allentown, died shortly after being struck by a car at Bixler's Jewelers in the 3100 block of Tilghman Street. Three other customers were hospitalized. The driver, 82-year-old Sung Yeung Kam, of Allentown, and store employees were uninjured, police said."
• "On Feb. 25, 1999, Chantal Rodriguez, 2, of Whitehall, died after an automobile crashed into La Fontana restaurant at 960 Broadway, a Fountain Hill pizza shop owned by her father, Chavez "Chance" Rodriguez. Two other restaurant patrons were injured in the crash."

I can't help noting the two bollards in front — set so far apart at the far sides of the shop's entrance that, well, a vehicle could drive straight between them.  'Just sayin'....

Photo: LehighValleyLive

Thanks to Rob Reiter for the heads-up on this accident.

NHTSA: Gas Pedal Accidents More Common Among Older Female Drivers

Photo via Google Images

A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) study's findings about pedal confusion generated a flurry of news stories April 13 2012 after the Associated Press reported that the study concluded 'older female drivers are more likely to have gas pedal accidents'.

"Accidents in which drivers mistakenly hit the gas instead of the brake tend to involve older female drivers in parking lots, a new government study has found," reported AP's Joan Lowy.

"One of the study’s most striking and consistent findings was that nearly two-thirds of drivers who had such accidents were female. When looking at all crashes, the reverse is true — about 60 percent of drivers involved in crashes are male, the [NHTSA] study noted. Another finding: Gas pedal accidents tend to occur more frequently among drivers over age 76 and under age 20. ..."

Pedal confusion is frequently cited as a factor in news accounts of storefront crashes.

Here's the full NHTSA study report (PDF).

Can Parking Assist Systems Prevent Accidents?

A Feb. 24th New York Times article about how parking assist systems might aid senior drivers made me wonder: Does technology exist — if only on the drawing board, so far — that would counteract driver pedal confusion while parking?

I emailed that very question to Dr. Bryan Reimer at MIT, the researcher quoted in the NYT piece, and will see who else in the vehicle safety/research community I can pester.

Meanwhile, here's a link to the article: For Older Drivers, Help With Parking.

Former State Trooper Reaching Out to Senior Drivers' Families

By the time he retired from his post as an assistant district commander of the Ohio State Highway Patrol in 2005, Matt Gurwell's 24 years on the job had shown him just about every kind of trouble a driver could encounter.

Those experiences motivated him to launch Keeping Us Safe, LLC—and to author "Beyond Driving with Dignity; The workbook for the families of older drivers."

"It was the result of 20-plus years of holding dying people in my arms at terrible car accidents, and delivering dozens and dozens of death notifications to families," explains Matt.

"I would much rather work with families to bring a peaceful resolution to this sensitive and uncomfortable issue now, rather than have them deal with it when a state trooper is knocking on their front door."

As founder & CEO of Keeping Us Safe, LLC, Matt lectures throughout the United States on topics related to the aging process and its adverse affects on driving skills.

Since leaving the Patrol, he has participated in a tremendous amount of work in the area of older driver research, best practices, vehicle safety technologies, and adaptive equipment.

Matt's mission: Provide strategies and guidance to seniors that will help them drive safely until the decision is made to retire from driving. He also provides an array of services and resources for both families and professionals as they deal with this very sensitive issue.

"My experiences as a trooper enabled me to apply a creative, innovative and common sense approach—combined with the ability to bring calm and resolve to stressful situations—in delivering Keeping Us Safe's programs without jeopardizing the dignity of others," Matt says.

Talking with a senior loved one about his or her driving ranks high on the list of stressful situations many families face. Matt Gurwell's "Beyond Driving with Dignity; The workbook for the families of older drivers" can help take some of that stress away.

(Full disclosure: I'll make a small percentage when you get your copy through StorefrontCrashes.com.)

After all those years managing accident scenes, Matt could have thrown in the towel after turning in his badge. Some of those memories couldn't be too pleasant.

That he chose instead to put his knowledge, skills and experience to work on behalf of the driving public—and senior drivers' families in particular—shows what kind of guy he is, as well as what level of priority this issue deserves: top-notch.

New Resource for Families of Senior Drivers

Aging affects our driving skills. Sad but true.

I know my own eyesight isn't what it was 30 years ago, for example. I'm sure it will be even more different 30 years from now. And vision is just one element of driving ability.

We all get older one day at a time. With "Baby Boomers" advancing into their senior years, however, the proportion of older drivers is growing rapidly in the U.S. Likewise in some other nations.

That makes family conversations about driving by older adults important and timely. Such conversations need to begin long before a family reaches the "Give me those keys!" stage.

Those four words strike fear and indignation into the heart of most any senior driver. (In fact, call a Baby Boomer of any age a "senior driver" and see what kind of "Who you callin' a senior citizen?" stare you get!)

Driving means independence. Independence means freedom of choice, freedom of movement—and dignity.

Enter "Beyond Driving with Dignity; The workbook for the families of older drivers."

This user-friendly workbook was developed to offer concerned families a working roadmap (complete with actual exercises) on how to address the issue of driving safety with an older adult in your family.

The workbook has been designed to offer additional peace of mind to families, help older drivers maintain their independence and dignity, and at the same time help prevent unnecessary deaths and injuries on our nation's roadways—not to mention our nation's storefronts.

Many of the crashes chronicled on this site involved a senior driver. Some mistakenly hit the gas instead of the brake. Some mistakenly put their vehicle in "drive" instead of "reverse." Some, like the driver who hit me, didn't know what went wrong.

StorefrontCrashes.com isn't about pointing fingers. It's about finding solutions. So, I'm interested in spotlighting resources that help drivers of any age—and their families—come to grips with issues that affect safety.

Full disclosure: I'll make a small percentage off the sale of "Beyond Driving with Dignity; The workbook for the families of older drivers." Hopefully, extra proceeds can help in raising awareness about vehicle-into-building crashes.

Driver behavior is only one factor in these crashes. Protecting people requires multiple strategies—because I believe accidents can happen despite drivers' best intentions.

But this workbook is a great step toward addressing one of the prime vehicle-into-building accident factors.

Please let me know how it works for you—via the comments area or with an email to mark 'at' storefrontcrashes.com.

Your feedback will no doubt also be appreciated by author Matt Gurwell, founder & CEO of Keeping Us Safe, LLC. He lectures throughout the United States on topics related to the aging process and its adverse effects on driving skills.

More about Matt in an upcoming post. He's been very selective about the platforms through which this workbook is offered, so my thanks to him for reaching out to you through StorefrontCrashes.com.

Get your copy of "Beyond Driving with Dignity; The workbook for the families of older drivers" at: www.keepingussafe.org/workbooksc.htm.

Age Appears to be a Significant Factor in Storefront Crashes

Senior drivers are conspicuously well represented in our weekly roundups here of storefront crashes. Drivers at the older, and at the very young, end of the age spectrum seem to account for the largest number of these accidents.

Robert Wang, staff writer for CantonRep.com in Ohio, wrote this excellent piece published about a month ago: 'When are you too old to drive?' While it focuses on Ohio drivers, it's a good primer on the topic of senior driving issues and offers tips for seniors and their families.

Age, of course, isn't the only factor. I'll soon have stats together for crashes reported here over the past several months, which will reveal some interesting trends. For example, certain states have noticeably more storefront crashes than others.

Pointing the finger at any particular group of drivers isn't a solution to the problem, of course. (Personally, I suspect that no matter what steps are taken to address driver behavior, accidents will continue to happen. Which leads me to ask what businesses, and the folks who design and build stores and other commercial buildings, can do to protect customers, employees and pedestrians—a topic for another day.)

Looking into who's involved in storefront crashes, and grasping the most common circumstances of these incidents, will hopefully at least provide some useful clues for safety experts to use in developing prevention strategies.

Getting the 'Fit' Right for Senior Drivers

Edmunds.com features a good overview about the challenges facing senior drivers and how car companies and nonprofits are responding. Designing Better Cars for Senior Drivers, by Dale Buss, particularly focuses on efforts to improve compatibility between a senior driver and his or her vehicle via the CarFit initiative.

Edmunds.com photo caption: Wearing Ford's Third Age suit, Eero Laanso demonstrates how it can help simulate an elderly person's maneuverability. (Photo courtesy of Ford Motor Company)

Image source: Edmunds.com