Two kids hit by cars in separate spots
A kid on the way to school (the entirely secular école primaire Christ-Roi in Ahuntsic, incidentally) was hit by a schoolbus on Thursday morning, and another kid, this one only three years old, was hit downtown on the way to daycare. Both kids had head injuries but are expected to survive.
Joey 15:40 on 2024-09-05 Permalink
The downtown story is the stuff of parents’ (and some drivers’) nightmares – kid darts into the street and gets hit by a car. Even The Economist argues that cars today are simply too big and heavy, especially electric cars. In this case the driver probably did nothing wrong and could not have done anything to prevent hitting the child, and yet it happened – and the result is surely worse because everyone (presently company included, I’m afraid) drives cars that are too big, and ludicrously marketed as “safe.”
dwgs 10:10 on 2024-09-06 Permalink
I generally agree with your point Joey, the number of huge SUV’s and pickups on the road these days is crazy. But physics being what it is, if that kid had been hit by me on my bicycle (roughly 230lbs between me and the bike) at 25kph he’d likely still be in hospital with a head injury.
Uatu 12:28 on 2024-09-06 Permalink
Yeah but would you be doing a full 25kph on a downtown street? You could also probably react faster with better sightlines and the impact area of a SUV grille vs a bike wheel is greater. Maybe there would be an injury but not as bad?
Ian 11:21 on 2024-09-07 Permalink
Given the video we all saw earlier this year of a bicyclist on a bixi plowing into a kid skipping across the street for her schoolbus, a bicyclist can definitely go fast enought to knock down a medium size kid, let alone a three-year old. Having had a couple of three year olds myself and having witnessed all their friends, 3 year olds are very prone to falling over and hitting their heads even wihtout any kind of vehicle of any size involved. I’ve seen them run straight into each other and fall over.