You can hear Road Safety Council chairman Gay Byrne saying it already as he dons his special glasses to look at the video on this You Tube thing. "We need more speed cameras", he'll sagely conclude at the end.
The video below features three boyos from the "city of Nenagh", Tipperary (and it's not "a long way away" enough, after seeing this). The lads thought it would be a very good idea to film themselves proudly standing in front of their cars, registration plates and all, and then post footage of their adventures driving around the locality doing various, erm, death-defying stunts on You Tube.
Needless to say, it didn't take long for our super sleuth gardai to track them down while watching the whole thing over a few doughnuts in the station, after the Road Safety Authority had brought the video to their attention. "If a young child had cycled out on that road, if they had come around a corner and found a slow-moving tractor, it would have been mayhem", said the RSA's Noel Brett. It would, Noel. Mayhem. I wonder how many liiives you've saved by telling us that?
Anyway, the video is causing a bit of a stir in Ireland at the minute - it even got a slot on RTE news the other night. Much of the hysteria is of the "we are all going to be killed by speeding, reckless hoodlums as soon as we venture on to the roads" variety. Never mind the fact that these half-wits in their clapped out bangers - look at the windscreen on one of them - would probably have been overtaken by Gaybo himself.
They are just eejits. Get over it.
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18 comments:
You say eejits GM I could think of an alternative description. Did I see that right? The driver of one of of those cars had his right leg out the window? How did he control the pedals? Second thoughts...I don't want to know.....
Though GM I know exactly what you mean give the PTBs any excuse and they will come down on all those going half a kilometer over....Ouh not to mention the salivation which will accompany the new "private" speed cameras. I wonder how many will be placed on the blackspots, boreens, and roads stuck together with plasterscene?
Grand Grand Grand (one for luck? Grand) country, oireland.....
Ouh Mr "the uncle" Gaybo looks sooo chic, on his new motorcycle.
Yes, they are more than eejits, if I'm honest, D. Don't really want to think about that one myself.
Then, eejits and all as they are, they take it to a whole new level and post it up on YouTube, with reg numbers, personal introductions and the works.
But yeah, I'm stuck between these eejits and professional hysteria merchant eejits like Uncle Gaybo and Noel Brett.
It's a no-win situation ;-)
Well ... it is a bit like posting pornographic pics of yourself on the internet. Just do it and live with the consequences. As to their traffic manners - just think how many similar morons are out there, not filming themselves?
But, and I am aware of putting an opener on a can of worms here, let us be honest and call spades spades and eejits ... well, eejits. Even if they go in big for the Darwin Award. Frankly I've had it with the eulogies after another bunch of, er, young road users end up six feet under.
Just take the recent crash in Donegal - eight grown men in a Volkswagen Passat? Do I really have to spell "non-survivable accident" here? But the YouTube-clips are causing major upset, while the clear and evident truth about the Donegal accident is shrouded (no pun intended) in waffle.
Similar to "tragic mum who couldn't go slower in thick fog as she was holding others up", you know, the woman that crashed into the back of a fire engine ...
Yes, every road death is untimely and tragic, let us take that as a given. But let us also be much, much clearer on the cause of the death.
Let's do away with "Seamus O'P, 23 year old son of local hurling legend Sean and wife Mairead, a well-known charity activist, was tragically killed when his car lost control ..." Instead just say "a 23 yr old man was killed after driving over the speed limit and under the influence." To the point. Maybe some people would then get the point.
And maybe instead of interviewing the local priest ("the community is in shock, he was well-known, a young man who was the life of every party, helpful to the old, nice to kittens") ... let the A&E staff get a word in: "Well, his fragmented liver could have been replaced with dialysis, his lungs punctured by twelve ribs would have healed over time and wheelchairs are quite comfortable as well these days, but the parts of his brain that were not splattered on the dashboard would have severely impaired his chances of a Nobel Prize. Yet he was nearly fully conscious when he arrived here, wonder what went through his mind in the last half hour of his life, when excruciating pain ultimately led to a total shut-down we could not reverse ..."
Yeah, I know, I'm ranting again ...
"Similar to "tragic mum who couldn't go slower in thick fog as she was holding others up", you know, the woman that crashed into the back of a fire engine ..."
Please tell me that isn't serious?
What idiot would say that let alone print or publish it anywhere?
The idea of driving in fog is to go only as fast as it is SAFE to do so and feck anyone else behind you who don't like it
Unfortunately, Lew - headline was "Killed by Crazy Drivers" (note the passive), further details "Tragic Kate Moyles was killed in Ireland's worst pile-up because reckless drivers tailgated in fog, an inquest heard yesterday." See http://tinyurl.com/2ebhm79 for the story as reported in the "Mirror" - the implication always being that she was killed because crazy drivers were tailgating ...
Bottom line for me: She smashed into a fire engine without breaking. No-one else (except a stationary fire engine with lights blazing) was involved.
No disrespect to Kate Moyles intended, I hasten to add.
I'd forgotten about that one.
I think the RSA and all these other wasters really need to concentrate their ad campaigns on teaching people how to use motorways, for example. Too many "road safety" ads are silly quasi-dramas that are laughable, frankly.
I've driven on the scariest French rocades, for instance. I've done 155mph on an Autobahn, but nothing is as scary as trying to come off the M50 between, say, Junction 7 and Junction 4. Not because they are necessarily driving fast, but because there is no rhyme or reason to the progess of traffic in each lane... in most countries, the traffic in the outside lanes moves faster, incrementally, than the traffic on the inside lane... in Ireland, they just don't keep left when possible - each driver appropriates a lane for themselves, and refuses to budge. Kinda awkward if you are trying to get from the outside to the inside lane (since the N7) for your junction because they all drive up each others' you-know-whats.
Glad I've never had to share a motorway with them in the fog!!!!
@GM 18:16 yep, strange but true. There is a consistent minority of drivers in Dublin/Ireland - especially Dublin - who think ignorance is a fashionable choice. I also did alot of driving in other countries and very seldom came across such flippant ignorance. Okay there’s bad drivers everwhere but it seems to be a power thing here and hence funnily enough a description is almost elusive. It wouldn't be so bad but alot of it is dangerous stupidity. Its strange, as this phenomenon IMO, wasn't as bad 6 or 7 years ago. What is it? Are the Irish still not used to motorways, or having to wear their seat belts? What is it? There must be some reason for it?
The RSA can show whatever statistics they want on road safety but anyone who drives in Dublin regularly, if they are honest, will tell you its the most frustrating experience imaginable.
@ Lew. You're absolutely right. You go no faster than you can see you can stop ahead. At the same time I see that people here don't seem to have the slightest idea about stopping distances - hail, rain, or fog.
@ Bernd. You're a very articulate "ranter" I must say. And the sound of the "passive voice" in Ireland is all too loud.
@ Dakota. It is. It's a scary place, full of eejits. And worse.
www.youtube.com/v/xG-lczsY3v0
Don't think that link is working, Anon.
It werx here GM fella... but anywayz.. try diss
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xG-lczsY3v0
x
Cheers F.
No probz lar :)
what can i say after seening this on the sunday paper i had to see for myself .
well stupid it all was getting yourselves video on camera when they garda can see the number plate.
but there to stupid to know this there brain problem is not fully grown yet.how was he going to stop the car with his feet out the window
if a car had to pull out in front of him mabe it was going to stop with hopes and dreams he thought.
This video is very thought provoking, but it lacks the impact a 32 ton articulated truck would bring.
Good point, GG.
They'd better hope anyone driving such a truck, and coming in the opposite direction, isn't fannying about like they are...
everyone giving out about tis video ye when nenagh wins a hurling match every parent in the town drives around with there kids hanging out the windows of the car yet they get away with it and tat is more dangerous cause kids are at risk
I agree entirely... a lot of hysteria over something that's just a bit, well, silly.
But what were they thinking putting it up on YouTube, reg plates and all?
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