Bloke crams 13 into Volvo S70 A north London teacher has been banned from driving for 12 months, fined almost £1,000 and ordered to take an extended driving test after breaking the "most people in a Volvo S70" world record by cramming 12 passengers into the red saloon before squeezing behind the wheel. Abraham Gniwosch, of Tottenham, was pulled on 8 August …
is 10 teenagers/twenties into a Ford Cortina back in the 80s. Brother was driving; his mate in the front passenger seat with gf on his lap; 4 of us crammed in the back seat, 2 with gfs on laps, plus one in the boot. We travelled about 32 km(about 20 miles for you Brits/Yanks) like this at 30 kmh (19 mph) with the tyres scraping the wheel-arches, and the poor old car was never quite the same afterwards! Never saw a cop on the way either...
If the police want to see "serious dramatic overloading" they should try looking on any peak-time train on the Paddington line.
Despite the fact that I have paid half the GDP of a small African nation for a seat, I am frequently forced to travel crammed into the aisle or those porch areas where the carriages join (and where the train is most likely to break apart in the event of a high-speed derailment or collision).
Why does the law see it as perfectly safe and reasonable to transport thousands of commuters in those conditions at speeds approaching 100MPH every day on one of the busiest rail lines in the country, but take a dim view of someone carrying a dozen people in similar circumstances in a volvo travelling at 20MPH on a back road in Wales?
Don't get me wrong - I believe that this guy should have been prosecuted, but only because there were children in the car who could not reasonably be expected to weigh up the risks involved. But by the same measure First Great Western should also be prosecuted. In fact what they do is worse because they are transporting paying customers and routinely put their passengers at risk for the financial gain of cramming a few more on.
@ AC 16:05 yesterday: Most of these people are talking about the roads many, many years ago. They're also talking about near-adult pranks where they knew they were being a bit dim but thought it was funny. Entirely different from wilfully putting your dependents at risk. Loose kida in a car are a fucking menace; I've seen drivers trying to proceed with their child stood between the front seats tugging on their shoulder.
"Why does the law see it as perfectly safe and reasonable to transport thousands of commuters in those conditions at speeds approaching 100MPH every day on one of the busiest rail lines in the country, but take a dim view of someone carrying a dozen people in similar circumstances in a volvo travelling at 20MPH on a back road in Wales?"
Because there are thousands of road accidents every day (many involving back roads in Wales...), whereas trains almost never crash (and where they do, I doubt it makes much difference if you're standing or sitting). And the family were from London - were they really going to stay at 20mph all the way home?
Tis easy to see why the UK is going to pot. We are no longer allowed to assess our risks and take them accordingly.
I think it is ludicrous that now if I am driving in atrocious weather conditions along a narrow dangerous road with no footpaths at night and come across a mother and baby walking home, I am not allowed to stop and give them a lift as it would be too dangerous and hence against NuLabs laws. Children under 3 have to sit in a special child seat so I could lose my license and car if this lot are anything to go by. In our extended family (cousins etc) we had about 20 children who did not have seats to travel in. God knows how they survived, may I burn in hell!
Many of these passenger number restrictions have come in not for safety reasons but because of the US style compensation claim culture. The insurance companies are reluctant to expose themselves to a massive compo claim from many unexpected passengers and so now state that if you have more passengers then the insurance is invalid as a getout.
I used to have a Microbus with bench seats and we often had 12/13 with prams and luggage. When you have passengers of any number you drive more defensively and if some tosser comes slamming round a corner on the wrong side of the road etc, then tough! It is risk we all take every time we go out, however in normal driving YOU dictate how close you are to the car in front, edge of the road, speed and direction. If you can't do it safely you shouldn't be on the road anyway.
When I wert lad, my dad used to take us lots of places in lots of different vehicles, cars, lorries, landrovers. No seatbelts then and we had bench seats in the front. One day in 62, in the landrover he said " never brake in snow on a corner or this will happen" and showed us, a lesson we have all kept with us. If something had happened then my dad may have ended up feeling guilty, but we kids wouldn't have held it against him as we were busy enjoying life and learning.
The state we are in now (nanny), we are no longer allowed to think for ourselves or assess our own risk taking because some moron jobsworth who is not as intelligent has decided otherwise. The end result, boring lives which then lead to us starving or freezing on the streets as penniless pensioners.
And quite honestly if the moron is driving badly then the passengers will stand a better chance inside any vehicle rather than outside fully exposed.
The bloke should have pleaded not guilty but then with our magistrates system, there is a little man who tells the magistrates that regardless of what they think they have to find the defendant guilty or they will lose their JP status. ie more jobsworths.
For those who berate him and say "but what if", get over it nothing happened. I have no doubt you all think cameras are for safety when no-one will publish the figures that will confirm it: The total number of cars clocked "speeding" versus the total number of these "clocked" cars involved in an accident at the time and scene of the clocking.
To this poster and all others who seem to be ignorant of the laws of physics.
Imagine a flatbed truck with 12 unsecured objects on it, each weighing in at at least 30 kilos. Then imagine the truck involved in a collision. What happens to the load?
Then imagine putting the 12 objects on seats and putting them behind 1/4'' sheet of glass. I dont know about you but, i would think a 30 kilo kiddie missile constitues a risk to other people. Seatbelt laws for rear occupants were primarily brought in to prevent killing people sitting in front of them and people in the way when they went flying through the windscreen.
'No longer allowed to think for ourselves.' - Ah, that's ok. So when my kids about to stick their hand onto a hot stove I'll just stand and watch and let them think for themselves shall I?
For everyone else arguing that it's the nanny state, go cram you, you're loved ones and a few mates into a car and drive around until some other dick on the road turns it into meat blender and after you're finished burying your family you get back to me. Though you'll still probably blame the other guy.
The man's an idiot of the highest order.
/rant
Everywhere.
Have I been involved in stupidly over-loading a car ?? Yes, 8 in a Mk3 Escort and 7 in a Mk1 Golf. I was old enough to know better, but all those involved still look back on those moments with fond-ness.
Would I do the same today ?? Probably not. I like my licence and the roads today are very different to the roads those incidents took place on.
So, to all those going "oh dear god, you're all so stupid to be bragging about such things", many of those are sarcastic and many are harking back wistfully to days gone by. Get a grip. Most of the cars mentioned that took part in these incidents are 15+ years since they've been usable cars (one mentions an Austin 1100 for fucks sake, that was my *dad's* first new car).
To put this into context, think of the number of famous faces, done for doing 100+ on the M1 and the like, given a £300-£400 fine and 6 month ban. Then we have a teacher, who overloaded his car, drove slowly on what was most likely a quiet country lane and he gets a £1000 fine and a 12 month ban.
The former can easily afford both the fine and the lack of transport, the latter has just had to fork over 5% of his salary.
Back in about 1998 the Jamaica Observer carried a story about the gentleman who drove home from a New Year's party with 12 passengers, all of them adult, in a Toyota Starlet... and not one of the four-door models, either. Apparently there were 3 in the front, including the driver, 5 in the back, and 4 more in the boot with the hatchback open. He went around a known dangerous corner (some kind soul had labled it Killer Corner, with a skull and cross-bones on a bright red background after the third fatal accident there, some time before this incident; the sign was still there the last time I went by, rather faded but present) much too quickly and had a slight head-on with a minibus going the other way. Oops. IIRC three dead and four severely injured. Killer Corner strikes again...
According to the Observer, the police dispatcher had quite some difficulty in understanding that the minibus was empty except for its driver, and the Starlet had 13 aboard.
Dead bird for obvious reasons.
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