Demonstrating the realities of drunk driving

By MARK NEWMAN Courier staff writer

April 21, 2009 11:43 am

— EDDYVILLE — The blood was fake. The siren wasn’t fake, the two cars weren’t fake and the teenagers inside them weren’t fake. Neither, said visiting experts, was the chance of such an accident happening in Iowa.
Six teenagers and two paramedics came as close as they could to showing the realities of drunk driving to students at Eddyville-Blakesburg High School on Monday.
The two cars had been placed in a “T” position; the students inside had accurate representations of potential injuries. After a class full of kids came to the outside bleachers, teacher Kate Proctor made a signal. A Mahaska County Hospital ambulance, with lights and siren going, came up the road and through the parking lot to the “accident” scene.
As they pulled up, one of the EMTs got on the two-way radio, and over the PA, could be heard “calling in” what they found and what they needed: a two-car accident, multiple casualties, roll two more units.
Then, as if they were at the scene of an accident, the two emergency workers approached the cars, one to each car. They began checking for vital signs to see who they should help first. Five passengers had “no vital signs” so they turned to the lone survivor and extracted him from the car and onto a back board.
“This is not theoretical to us,” said Bruce Spahr, a registered nurse with the ambulance service at Mahaska Health Partnership who was demonstrating the danger to students. “We’ve seen this.”
Some of the students seemed affected by what they saw; others seemed to laugh nervously.
“They act tough out here but they’ll think about this when they go home,” said Proctor. “They don’t show their [true] emotions in front of their friends, but they will think about this when it comes time to make a choice.”
That’s what she and the organizing students said they hope for: That before someone drives drunk, they think twice.
“This,” said Proctor, pointing to the bloody scene, “should be their second thought.”
“There’s a little time for it to sink in,” agreed Spahr.
Once the demonstration was under way, the crowd of kids was quiet.
Mike Sebeniecher, ambulance director for Mahaska Health Partnership, told students as he approached the car he had been able to smell alcohol.
If the driver survives his injuries, he said, with an emphasis on “if” — an OWI charge will be nothing compared to the thought of his friends being killed and the manslaughter charges he’ll face.
“Five deaths he’s responsible for,” Sebeniecher said. “He [could] have up to 25 years in prison to think about that party.”
To make a driving error like the one simulated in Eddyville Monday, you don’t have to be “swashbuckingly” drunk, said Sebeniecher. Just impaired enough to turn the wrong way or to miss a stop sign.
Students, including Quintin Durst and Levi Ratliff, had previously made a video against driving drunk. The project evolved from there. The professionals believe the high school kids helped tell a true story.
“This is good,” said Spahr. “It let’s you get an idea of what can happen.”
“This is pretty close to what we see when we pull up on a scene like this,” added Sebeniecher.
Mark Newman can be reached at 683-5358 or by e-mail at mgnewman@mchsi.com.

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