By William Shaw
Three short years ago, an 18-year-old young woman named Laura fell asleep. Her falling asleep quickly resulted in a nightmare.
Recent grads of Issaquah High School, Laura and her two friends Mora and Lindsay had enjoyed a week of sun and water at Laura’s home in Pateros, Wash. Soon, it was time for them to drive back home.
Cresting the Blewett Pass summit on Highway 97, Laura drifted off to sleep behind the wheel of her Nissan Pathfinder. The vehicle went off the shoulder and slammed into nearby trees at over 60 miles per hour. The impact mangled and crushed the right front half of the Pathfinder. Laura’s friend Mora was in the front passenger seat next to her.
Two good Samaritans, a plumber and a minister, stopped and helped Laura and Lindsay out of the car. Both girls were only slightly injured. Their friend Mora was encased in the shattered wreckage, dead or dying.
A Washington State Trooper was soon on the scene and radioed the Leavenworth aid crews to help the two girls. For 17 year-old Mora Shaw, he called the Kittitas County Coroner.
A woman named Carlee Norwood was driving by. Carlee, an emergency room trauma nurse, stopped and quickly took over the two men’s efforts to assist Mora, who was still in the wreckage. She had no vital signs. But, because of Carlee’s determined efforts, Mora eventually began to breathe again.
Aid crews soon converged on the scene, but Mora again succumbed to her injuries. In medical terms, she died during the Airlift Northwest helicopter flight to Seattle, and again at Harborview Medical Center’s emergency room. Both times, she was resuscitated by medical means.
At Harborview, the trauma team did not expect our daughter to survive the day. They urged my wife Mary Beth and I to make immediate preparations for her funeral.
But Mora did survive the day.
The State Troopers carrying out the accident investigation charged the driver with felony vehicular assault. The Kittitas County Prosecutor, however, feared a jury might not understand that like drunk driving, drowsy driving is an irresponsible conscious act that needs a punishment and a consequence. The felony charge was plea-bargained down to a criminal misdemeanor: vehicular assault. During the plea bargain hearing, Kittitas County Superior Court Judge Michael E. Cooper testily asked why this case was even brought into his courtroom. Sadly, like the driver, even Judge Cooper did not understand the seriousness and implications of drowsy driving. The driver was elicited a small fine, had her license suspended for 30 days and was sentenced to 240 hours of light ‘community service.’
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that 100,000 police-reported crashes are the direct result of driver fatigue each year. This results in an estimated 1,550 deaths, 71,000 injuries, and $12.5 billion in monetary losses.
The effects of drowsy driving are the same as drunk driving or driving while medicated: it impairs reaction time, judgment and vision. Drowsy driving decreases performance, vigilance and motivation. It also causes problems with information processing and short-term memory. Researchers in Australia showed that being awake for 18 hours produces an impairment equal to a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .05. After being awake for 24 hours, most subjects showed impairment equal to a BAC of .10. In Washington state, .08 BAC is considered legally drunk. Mora’s driver was awake for nearly twenty four hours before she got behind the wheel.
Our citizens and our state must change its attitude toward the dangers of drowsy driving. Like driving while intoxicated, legislation needs to be introduced to caution people to think twice before they get behind the wheel of a car when they have not slept. Strict, clear enforcement can hopefully prevent future suffering, terrible injuries or death caused by drowsy driving. Prosecutors should also be able to file cases and mete out meaningful justice under a specific law.
To address the problem of drowsy driving, we must also consider addressing the underlying causes of sleep deprivation, such as lifestyle, lengthy work hours, shift work, or untreated sleep disorders.
As we pass the third anniversary of this so-very-preventable crash, we as Mora’s parents cannot change what happened. We can only strive through public awareness and the urging of our state legislators toward firm action to prevent this tragedy from happening to any one else. We hope you will join us.
William Shaw is publisher of the Snoqualmie Valley Record.
