Three die as elderly motorist goes wrong way along dual carriageway

A ROAD safety body has called for older motorists to take driving refresher courses, after three people were killed in head-on car crash when an 80-year-old man drove the wrong way up a dual carriageway.

The accident happened on the northbound carriageway of the A78 near Troon, Ayrshire, after the elderly driver had entered the road going the wrong way from a roundabout.

He crashed into another car, killing teenagers Holly Fulton and Jayde McVicar, both from Greenock. An 18-year-old woman, who was in the same car as the teenagers, was seriously injured.

Police said it appeared that the man, Frank Muir of Linwood, Paisley, had been driving a Skoda Octavia along Gailles Road towards the Meadowhead roundabout, had entered the wrong way on to the northbound carriageway and his vehicle hit a Ford Fiesta heading north. The pensioner was taken to Crosshouse Hospital, where he died.

The other teenage girl, also from Greenock, was described as serious but stable in the same hospital last night.

The crash has again raised the issue of elderly drivers and whether they should, by law, face regular checks on their driving ability.

Neil Greig, from the Institute of Advanced Motoring (IAM), said: "This incident was quite unusual but it does fit in to a pattern of locations where older drivers start to struggle on high- speed roads, particularly at roundabouts and junctions.

"Also, older drivers tend to have fewer accidents at night because they self-regulate - they just don't go out in the evening. So this person seems to have been doubly unusual in that he was travelling on a high-speed road at night in his 80s."

Currently, the law requires older drivers only to get their driving licence renewed with a self-declaration of fitness to drive at the age of 70. Depending on the information given in that self-declaration, further information can be sought by the DVLA from the motorist's GP or a medical assessment may be required. The licence must then be renewed at the latest every three years, depending on what, if any, conditions the motorist suffers.

Mr Greig said the IAM was against compulsory testing, preferring to encourage older drivers to take refresher courses. "We don't believe compulsory testing would be helpful because elderly drivers, in general terms, are very safe," he said.

"Our view is if you were to introduce one, many older people who are perfectly safe and able to do a restricted number of journeys at times and in places they know are safe would just give up driving and they'd end up being a huge cost to society stuck at home."

He said any testing would invariably focus on urban driving, much the same as the current driving test, and therefore fail to address the areas of real concern for older drivers.

Mr Greig said the IAM advocated making refresher courses widely available, focusing on the key areas where older drivers needed support.

The Scottish Government's road safety framework has taken a similar tone, aiming to encourage rather than coerce older drivers to undertake further training.

The latest annual RAC motoring report examining the impact of an ageing population on motoring showed drivers over 70, if involved in a crash, were more likely to be at fault, especially in right-of-way incidents. Also, drivers over 85 involved in a crash are four times more likely to have caused it than to be an innocent victim,

The report showed an age divide over compulsory checks, with almost three-quarters of those under 64 believing that medical tests and driver evaluations for older motorists were necessary, compared with 20 per cent of those who would be affected by them.

However, older drivers were happy to be tested as part of a programme to check all drivers, provided they were not being singled out.

The RAC itself did not call for compulsory testing. Instead, its report concluded it would "welcome government initiatives to help older drivers to continue to drive safely"..