Not an Accident

[XLFD]

An elderly pedestrian was hit and killed on North Jebavy Road, south of the Dewey Road intersection this afternoon, by an SUV.  The undersheriff claims that it appears to be a total accident, as reported by the local newspaper:

Elderly man killed by SUV driver on Jebavy Drive

HAMLIN TWP. — An 82-year-old Ludington man was struck and killed by an SUV in a crash in the 2600 block of Jebavy Drive Thursday afternoon, according to Mason County Sheriff Kim Cole.

A release from the sheriff's office confirmed the age and town of residence for the deceased man in a press release Tuesday afternoon.

The man was pronounced dead at the scene.

The SUV was confirmed in the release to be a 2016 Ford Escape, driven by a 23-year-old woman from Howell.

It was traveling northbound on Jebavy Drive when it struck the Ludington man, who was crossing the street, Undersheriff Derrek Wilson said at the scene.

“It looks like a total accident,” he said.

The collision was called in around 2:06 p.m. Traffic was blocked off at Decker and Dewey roads.

Cole stated in the release that the case remains under investigation. However, he added that preliminary findings do not suggest that speed or alcohol contributed to the crash. [END]

This was far from being a total accident, anybody can come to that conclusion even before the investigation is finished.  An accident is defined by Wikipedia as "an unintended, normally unwanted event that was not directly caused by humans.  The term accident implies that nobody should be blamed, but the event may have been caused by unrecognized or unaddressed risks."

The elderly pedestrian may or may not be partially to blame as it is unclear from what we are told what he was doing on or near the road [the update claims he was crossing it].  One presumes that the 82 year old guy did not all of a sudden dart out into the road out of nowhere, simply because that would have likely been relayed, and the shoulder is fairly narrow and level throughout the 2600 block.

We do note that the weather was cloudy, so the sun cannot be blamed by either party, nor can we blame the collision on rain, or from wet roads or from any other physical factors that would have likely been acknowledged by the undersheriff.  This indicates that the northbound driver traveling on a flat surface should have seen this elderly man on or near the road as he approached and had a duty to slow down and exercise due care when he saw that the old guy was crossing it, as noted in the state's Uniform Traffic Code:

Had the driver abided by this general duty, then the only way this fatal event would have ever occurred is if the pedestrian did something totally unexpected at the last minute.  If this octogenarian was capable of such a move and did so, then he would be at least partially at fault; otherwise the driver would have been to blame for not exercising due care.  In other words, the "accident" was totally preventable if both had traveled responsibly; since one or both did something careless, it was not an accident.  It's highly likely that this would have been avoidable if the young woman had been driving responsibly.

Before the update said the pedestrian was crossing the road, I had speculated that the elderly man was traveling on the side of the road and was hit by the SUV driver who couldn't pass the pedestrian safely because oncoming southbound traffic kept him in his lane.  Many motorists will do that on that stretch of Jebavy Road between roughly Jagger and Dewey Road. 

The narrow lanes, one-foot-wide shoulder and mailboxes that hover over that narrow shoulder makes this a portion of road that I actively avoid while riding my bicycle.  When I have took that route, vehicles traveling above the 55 mph limit zoom by within inches because they can't be bothered to slow down for oncoming traffic to clear so that it's safe to pass.  

Do not be surprised that more fatalities may occur in the future in this section of road from the children in Hamlin riding their bicycle or walking to and from the new elementary school on North Jebavy this spring who travel this route.