Teen driver in fatal Beauce crash is brain-dead
Teen driver in fatal Beauce crash is brain-dead
The Gazette: Monday, October 5, 2009
MONTREAL – The 17-year-old driver who crashed an SUV into a building in the Beauce where a couple in their 50s was killed Sunday is brain-dead, police said Monday.
"It would take quite a miracle" for the young man's health status to improve, police Constable Mario Thiboutot of the Sûreté municipale de Saint-Georges said.
The driver is on life support in a hospital pending the arrival of certain family members, he said.
Louis Vaillancourt, 53, and Marie Faucher, 55, died instantly when a speeding car hurtled through their dwelling on the ground floor of an eight-unit apartment building on
6th Ave. near 35th St. in St. Georges, located about 105 kilometres southeast of Quebec City.
The car then crashed through another wall and into the living room of the adjacent dwelling. An 80-year-old man who lives there was not hurt, Thiboutot said.
Twelve other residents of the building have been relocated. The car crash took out some water pipes and knocked out the power. Inspectors were looking over the building on Monday to determine how to make it structurally sound again, Thiboutot said. But the residents can expect to live elsewhere for at least a few weeks, he said.
“I’m looking at the house right now and believe me, it’s quite something that the driver is still alive,” Thiboutot told The Gazette Sunday.
The 17-year-old driver was rushed to a nearby hospital. He was later transferred to a trauma centre in Quebec City.
It was not yet known whether alcohol was a factor in the crash, but the car was definitely going at high speed, according to Thiboutot.
The couple “died right away,” Thiboutot said. “They hardly suffered.”
The street has a slight curve in it but nothing explains why the driver might have lost control of the car. It could take weeks for the results of blood tests on the driver.
Neighbours told reporters at the scene they thought the crash was an earthquake or a bomb at first.
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