In rec.crafts.metalworking on Sat, 15 Jan 2005 17:21:58 -0500
Ed Huntress wrote:

The other guy didn't have a seatbelt. Like your grandmother, he had a
ruptured spleen. And a concussion. And a broken leg. He was bleeding from
his face and neck like a stuck pig. He barely made it. Just barely.


Seatbelts are compulsory in Australia, have been for many years.

Didn't stop people who had been driving before the law change from not
using the things though.

Way back when I was a little tacker, I had absorbed, as kids do, the
roadsafety messages they pushed at school, and I knew it was important
to have the belt on.

So I remember one day really hassling Dad to put his on. Whined and
nagged the way only small kids can.

So he did... And drove out the hobby farm gate and away.

Mum and I left about 20 mins later, came around a bend less than 1km
from the gate and there was a car in the ditch! "That's funny" said
Mum, "Why didn't Brian stop to help?"

You can guess why.

He'd failed to take the corner, no idea why. The car had speared off
the road, down a small embankment, hit a rock with its nose, and flipped
forward onto its back. He was hanging from his seatbelt, glass from the
smashed screen all over the place and in the arm thrown up to protect
his face.

Give him credit, he didn't need to be nagged after that.

Zebee