The Waterbury Democrat., 1935-07-25

Unto realization of the appalling
 risks of motoring. He does not
 translate dry statictics into real-
 ity of blood and agony.
 Figures exclude the pain and
 horror of savage mutilation--which means they leave out the point.
 They need to be brought closer
 home. A passing look at a bad
 smash or the news that a fellow you had lunch with last week is In a hospital with broken back
 will make any driver but a born fool slow down at least temporar-
 fly. But what is needed is vivid
 and sustained realization that every time you step on the throttle, death
 gets in beside you, hopefully wait ing for his chance. That single
 horrible accident you may have witnessed is no isolated horror.
 That sort of thing happens every
 hour of the day, everywhere in the | United States. If you really felt that, perhaps the cold lines of type in Mondays paper recording that total of 29 local citizens were killed in weekend crashes would rate | HUT V llidk O | tut-tut as you turn back to the
 sports page Mangled Body
 An enterprising judge now and
 again sentences reckless drivers to tour the accident end of a city
 morgue. But even a mangled body
 on a slab. waxily portraying the consequences of bad motoring judg-
 ment, isn't patch on the scene of
 the accident itself. No artist work ing on a safety poster would dare
 depict that in full detail.
 That picture would have to in- | clude motion picture and sound ef-
 fects, too-the Hopping, pointless efforts of the injured to stand up;
 the queer, grunting noises; the
 steady, panting grooming of hu-
 man being with pain creeping up on him as the shock wears off. It
 should portray the slack expression on the face of 8 man, drugged with shock, staring at the Z-twist' in his
 broken leg, the insane crumpled ef- feet of a child's body after it's
 bones are crushed inward, a realis- tic portrait of an hysterical woman
 with her screaming mouth opening a hole in the bloody drip that fills
 her eyes and runs off her chin.
 Minor details would include the raw ends of bones protruding
 through flesh in compound frac-
 lures, and the dark red, oozing surfaces where clothes and skin
 were flayed off at once.
 Those are all standard, everyday sequels to the modern passion for going places in a hurry and taking a chance or two by the way. If ghosts could be put to a useful pur- pose, every bad stretch of road in
 the United States would greet the oncoming motorist with groans and
 screams and the educational spec tacle of ten or a dozen corpses, all sizes, sexes and ages. lying horribly still on the bloody grass.
 Consequences
 Last year a state trooper of my acquaintance stopped big red His pailo for speeding. Papa was ob- viously . responsible person. obs viously set for a pleasant weekend with his family-so the officer cut into papass well-bred expostula- tions: "Ill let you off this time, but if you keep on this way, you
 won't last long. Get going--but take 1t easier" Later a passing motorist hailed the trooper and asked if the red Hispano had got ticket. Nc" said the trooper. T hated to spoil their partyj' "Too
 bad you didn't" said the motorist,
 "I saw you stop them-and then I passed that car again 50 miles up the line. It still makes me feel sick at my stomach. The car was all folded up like an accordion-the color was about all there was left.
 They were all dead but one of the
 kids-and he wasn't going to live to
 the hospital"
 Maybe 1t will make you sick at
 your stomach, too. But unless
 you're a heavy-footed incurable, a good look at the picture the artist
 wouldn't dare paint, first-hand
 acquaintance with the results of
 mixing gasoline with speed and bad Judgment, ought to be we'll worth your while. I can't help it if the
 facts are revolting. If you have the nerve to drive fast and take
 chances, you ought to have the
 nerve to take the appropriate cure. | You can't ride an ambulance or watch the doctor working on the
 victim in the hospital, but you can
 read.
 The automobile is treacherous, I Just as a cat Is. It is tragically diff ficult to realize that it can become | the deadliest missile. AS enthu-
 siasts tell you. it makes 65 feel like
 nothing at all. But 65 an hour is | 100 feet a second, a speed which puts a viciously unjustified respon- sibility on brakes and human re- flexes, and can instantly turn this docile luxury into a mad bull ele- phant.
 Inescapable
 Collision, turnover or sideswipe, each type of accident produces either a shattering dead stop or 8 crashing change of direction--and. since the occupart-meaning you
 continues in the old direction at the original speed. every surface and angle of the cars interior im- mediately becomes a battering, tearing projectile. aimed squarely at you-inescapable. There is no bracing yourself against these im- Derative laws of momentum.
 It's like going over Niagara Falls in steel barrel full of railroad spikes. The best thing that can happen to you = and one of the rarer things-is to be thrown out as the doors spring open, so you have only the ground to reckon with. True, you strike with as much force as if you had been thrown from the twentieth century at top speed But at least you are spared the lethal array of gleaming metal knobs and edges and glass inside the car.
 Anything can happen in that split second of crash, even those lucky escapes you hear about. Peo-