[ad_1]
The coroner has found that the road knowledge questionnaire that tourists must answer before renting a car is “totally inappropriate”.
File photo.
Photo: 123rf
The findings are in a report on the 2017 deaths of Southland’s couple Jesse and Samantha Shortland.
His car was hit when the one driving German tourist Marina Liebl crossed the center line near Lumsden.
Liebl also died.
While both Shortlands died, their two children, one two years old and the other three months old, escaped with minor injuries.
Coroner David Robinson fell short in making formal recommendations, but encouraged car rental companies to come up with a better assessment of whether foreign drivers were ready to drive on New Zealand roads.
He said fatigue was a factor in the crash for both drivers, as was their speed.
Five seconds before the accident, Liebl was driving at 134 km / h, slowing down to 73 km / h at the moment of impact.
Shortlands’ vehicle was moving at 119 km / h when they collided.
Robinson said cannabis was found in Jesse Shortland’s system, and while he couldn’t determine his level of intoxication, he couldn’t rule out the possibility that this may have slowed his reaction time.
Judy Richards, whose son Rhys Middleton was killed by a tour driver in 2016, welcomed the call for car rental companies to improve their driver evaluations.
He said car rental companies needed to up their game and should require tourists to take a practical test first.
He would also like foreign drivers to serve their sentence in this country, instead of being sent home.
