Dunkettle - now I've seen it all

Stugots

8.55am this morning, stopped on the roundabout at lights, saw a guy (60s ish) going the wrong way around the Dunkettle roundabout at a fair clip on the innermost lane. Blissfully unaware that all the stopped traffic was facing the other direction. Don't know what happened to him. I didn't hear any crash!

j8wk2feszrnpao

Trying to think at which junction they decided to turn right to go anticlockwise around Dunkettle! :P

Stugots

I was in the 2nd from left lane at the last lights before the tunnel when he came around from the other side. He either turned right when he came out of the tunnel or coming from Cork. Or maybe he came on the wrong side of the road from the Glanmire roundabout!

CHealy

Iv seen this before about 5 years ago on the Kinsale Road Roundabout. Myself and another fella got out and we managed to stop the traffic to get her into the lane by where the Ambulances come out. Turns out she was a very confused Alzhiemers patient who managed to get out of her home and drive out the road. The Pharmacy brought her in and called for help. Might be something like that in this case, either way its deadly dangerous.

Blitzkrieger

I once saw an old woman try to turn right onto the magic roundabout. This was back in the days before the flyover when there was even more traffic than today. She spent ****ing ages inching forward and trying to right. The worst thing was she had an elderly female passenger too. Wtf was wrong with the pair of them......

hans aus dtschl

I also saw this happen on the old Kinsale Road Roundabout, with a middle-aged looking fella. Gardai banging on his bonnet persuaded him to drive into the centre of the roundabout, where he turned around and tried to continue and join traffic the correct way!

EdgeCase

It can happen. Not everyone (young or old) is always at there peak cognitive ability all the time. All it takes is something minor to go wrong with your brain momentarily and you're confused.

At least he managed to do it on a fairly busy but slow moving complex roundabout and not on a quiet motorway.

When you think about it, it's amazing and impressive in a way that this kind of thing happens so infrequently.

namloc1980

Saw the same on the Kinsale road roundabout around 6 months ago.

j8wk2feszrnpao

EdgeCase wrote: »

It can happen. Not everyone (young or old) is always at there peak cognitive ability all the time.

When driving, you should be attentive. This isn’t a minor issue, this is driving against traffic. The driver should be stripped of their license and have to re-sit the driving test.

EdgeCase

munstermagic11 wrote: »

When driving, you should be attentive. This isn’t a minor issue, this is driving against traffic. The driver should be stripped of their license and have to re-sit the driving test.

Did I say it was a minor issue?!

The problem is that it can happen at random and without warning.

All I'm saying is it's a rare event and also that it's largely something you cannot completely eliminate because someone who was fine yesterday may be cognitively impaired today and not even know they are.

I'm not sure why they'd have to resit their test, but they should be required to sit a competency test based more around whether they're medically fit to drive.

You could be talking about someone having a bad reaction to a new medication, a diabetic with poor sugar control having a hypoglycemic incident, someone with a cardiac issue, someone with epilepsy, onset of Alzheimer's, a brain tumor, the list is endless and the circumstances aren't all one size fits all.

Some things may be one off, some may be permanent or unfortunately, progressive and render driving beyond someone's abilities.

j8wk2feszrnpao

EdgeCase wrote: »

Did I say it was a minor issue?!

I didn’t say you did, that was my assessment.

EdgeCase wrote: »

The problem is that it can happen at random and without warning.

All I'm saying is it's a rare event and also that it's largely something you cannot completely eliminate because someone who was fine yesterday may be cognitively impaired today and not even know they are.

If someone is prone to being that cognitively impaired, then they shouldn’t be driving; take their license away to try prevent a recurrence.

EdgeCase

The question is are they prone to it, or is it a one off temporary glitch.

That's something that can only be assessed medically.

There needs to be a process for dealing with the aftermath of an incident like that but if shouldn't be resit the full driving test or some kind of punishment.

It should be a safety intervention and assessment.

j8wk2feszrnpao

EdgeCase wrote: »

The question is are they prone to it, or is it a one off temporary glitch.

That's something that can only be assessed medically.

There needs to be a process for dealing with the aftermath of an incident like that but if shouldn't be resit the full driving test or some kind of punishment.

It should be a safety intervention and assessment.

If you end up driving the wrong way round the Dunkettle Roundabout, I don’t think you are fit to have a driving license until you resit the test or at least have the license suspended to allliw for the intervention you mentioned.

Chances are, this might have been the first time they’ve encountered a signlized roundabout, and didn’t have the basics to navigate it.

I know it seems extreme, but the incident was at best someone without the basics to drive, at worst someone who may be prone to glitches.

Fabio

Stugots wrote: »

8.55am this morning, stopped on the roundabout at lights, saw a guy (60s ish) going the wrong way around the Dunkettle roundabout at a fair clip on the innermost lane. Blissfully unaware that all the stopped traffic was facing the other direction. Don't know what happened to him. I didn't hear any crash!

I was the guy on the motorbike beeping and waving frantically for him to stop as he crawled by me. I was just thankful I wasn't coming around the roundabout from the M8 a few minutes later cos I may well have ended up on his front bonnet had that been the case.