Five Drinking Drivers

[Music] back this is Catamount racetrack in Milton Vermont build is the home of the brave Catamount gives thousands of race fans a thrilling spectacle every Saturday night during the racing season last season race fans witnessed a different sort of spectacle and this is where it all happened my name is Tom Riley with Vermont's project crash crash is part of a Federal program designed to rid our nation's highways of the drunk driver and we'd like to share this spectacle with you because if you're like most of us you do drink and drive last summer we selected volunteers from the audience here at Catamount racetrack because we wanted to run it in front of 4,000 race fans on a Saturday night we picked just five from the many who volunteered this is the story of how those five people drove under the effects of alcohol but before we get to the actual demonstration let's meet our five drinking drivers we first see them at a briefing session approximately 10 days before the big event sure I don't think so I'm Darvin Merill and I'm Project Director of crash in this state driving above 0.1 or for my case driving with more than six beers is illegal and we're it's not known by the General Public one how much you has to drink to get to that level and secondly what happens to your driving skills once you get to that level and so we wanted to do two things one we want to demonstrate for the general public that driving above 0.1 does affect degradate the dry Hills you don't drive so good after you've had a few drinks and two we want to put it on film because if if it works and people can relate to you and you because you're volunteers your people who we don't know didn't know before who raised your hand in the audience and said I think I'd like to try this might be able to show other people coming behind you that it that maybe it's a little risky if I drink six beers or so and attempt to drive from here on in the the drivers learn that they will be asked to drive through a special course on the track while sober then slightly impaired and finally impaired beyond the legal drinking driving limits each run will be scored so that each driver can be compared with himself as the alcohol in his or her bloodstream increases where you are before you drive each time yeah you may not know where you [Music] are we will know where you are assured that all aspects of the demonstration will be carried out with care and safety the drivers signify their agreement by signing releases and receive the traditional $1 bill to make it binding now let's get to know our drivers Frank like all our volunteers is an avid race fan he is a 27-year-old meat cutter who frequents a bar called the enex in a town several miles from the track uh how much Scotch you think we ought to bring along with us probably a fifth probably the fifth will do it uh you usually drink Scotch when you're out yeah uh what do you drink at home scotch or vodka scotch or vodka do you uh uh drink much beer at all not too much just mostly Scotch right you do most your drinking out bars usually here at the annex you know in the clubs you don't drink much at home then no when you drink uh well first of all how often do you drink usually have a couple of bubbles every night couple of bubbles every night you drink it uh every day then yeah I wanted to did you drink a little more on the weekends yeah uh how much do you drink on the weekends oh I'd say over the weekend probably fifth probably a fifth over the weekend uh well now you got you're sort of a special person in our uh in our little experiment and that you're the only one that suffered a DWI conviction how much did you have that night you know well uh they did a urine test and they said it was. 35 it's about 0.15 away from Death right do you have any idea of how much you drank that night uh a fifth of black Bel at least at least I see it was a little Corner a little how often do you think maybe you've done this in the past in the past before the conviction before the conviction uh quite often quite often and since your conviction uh I hand the case to somebody else you learned a lesson it's not worth uh walking for a year and I just got a bill in the mail today for my insurance company and the insurance rates are rather High how much do you think you can drink now and still navigate safely it depends on mixing the drinks I see uh my drinks a normal drink is 2 oz you know in a in a glass but I usually throw about three so how many of those do you think you can handle and still drive safely and say a 4H hour period of drinking oh eight eight so that's uh 24 o sure that's a fifth I don't think that and drive safely I think that I can drive in paired to a point above 1 you think so but uh words you're going to try and right I think that my uh my tolerance is is higher than somebody else that doesn't drink you know well we'll find out on Saturday night won we right we visit Joe Bashaw at his uncle's Farm the weatherman has promised thunderstorms and Joe is trying to get his hay in before it hits Joe is our youngest dver at 19 hi Joel hey good little hand yeah a little bit all set for Saturday night yeah I hope so you uh think you're going to give the lie to project crash and drive better drunk than you do over oh trry uh tell me you do most of your drinking at home no not really I go out up to stub stop over I see uh and what do you generally drink beer usually and how much of it Saturday Friday and Saturday night probably 89 uhhuh and you drink every day yeah usually at night do you ever drink anything besides beer sometimes I have a shot of liquor sometimes a shot about how often you do that once a week or maybe twice not much more than that you ever do any little extra celebrating like a Christmas Easter New Year yeah New Year New Year's how'd you do last New Year's bad bad what did you put away well we had a fifth of H Black Velvet and then we had two cases of beer and we were going to 4 in the morning I see who was driving uh was right it was in walking distance oh so nobody had to drive well good listen uh we're looking forward to Saturday night but before we take off um you know when we sto people on the highway we asked some tongue twisters now earlier I gave you ours and you said you had one of your own now I want you to try it now and then we'll try it again Saturday night after you've had a little bit to drink okay Betty B some butter the butter bet b was bitter so Betty bought some better butter make the bitter butter better but the bitter butter made a better but rder well that sounds a little bit more complicated than around the rugged Rock the Ragged Rascal ran she she I'm with the seashore okay we'll try that again Saturday night and I'll let you get back to your hanging thanks for taking the time show byebye next we stop in to see Roger Vincent a 27-year-old technician rer Roger has had a longtime interest in cars transmission what happened to it oh I got a couple bolts that shared off the torque converter and blowing the oil out on me so tore it out find out what was wrong with it going to put it back I don't think so going to junk the whole animal the whole thing get rid of it tear the engine out forget about it I guess what you going to get I'm not going to get anything I got my other car so oh you all set for Saturday night all set what do you want us to provide you with Saturday oh I think slits will be good enough slits you usually drink beer yeah well how much do you think we're going to have to feed you Saturday night a couple six packs anyhow anyhow we should have we should have maybe a case on hand for sounds good have you ever have you ever polished off a case in a day time yeah in a day time Drive afterwards no no had a hard time walking Roger uh when we stop people on the road you know we sometimes have them do manual dexterity tests and uh say tongue twisters and things I got one I want to lay on you right now okay so uh let's he you say around the rugged Rock the Ragged Rascal ran around the rugged Rock the rugged Rascal ran that's pretty good uh we'll try again Saturday night and see how you do after you've had your two sixpacks okay good enough I managed to spend a few minutes with Sue mayard at her office hi Su Hi how are you all SE for Saturday sure am I understand that you made a phone call in the office yesterday oh God I did you uh decided you wanted to back out or I had my doubts had your doubts how do you feel about being the only woman involved in this little project um I when I first found out I was it kind of bothered me a little but I don't know it doesn't really too much now I guess you know it just doesn't bother me anymore a lot of people give me hassles about it you know parents and stuff but I think it's all right I just want to find out a little bit about uh how experienced a drinker you are so we know how much we're going to have to provide you with now uh what do you what do you usually drink um usually depends the kind of mood I'm in if sometimes I well I usually drink beer or something but I like tequila you like tequila you usually drink beer yeah when how often do you drink beer oh a couple times a week maybe a couple times a week and when you do how much do you drink one time sixpack or more a sixpack or more Tuesday nights are bowling night and we usually go out and have a food with the girls and you work up with thirst H yeah you do most of your drinking uh with girlfriends or on a date or um yeah sometimes during the day when I'm home alone I do I see and when you don't drink beer you drink tequila mhm usually when you drink more than you usually drink uh how much do you drink what Kila wise you mean or just anything anything anything okay let's see probably about I can drink about half a fif of tequila and be all right so I feel you know but any more than that and I usually I get pretty drunk I guess and don't I usually like I don't know forget what I'm doing stuff like that uh I half a pit do you uh I'm not trying to put you on the spot but uh how often do you drive after you've had a half a I never drive when I drink oh you don't drive at all when you drink of course you're a little bit more fortunate than most of it should probably have somebody to drive you yeah I call the cab and ask for two driver two drivers yeah I see um told me you had a pretty good tongue twister that you could do better drunk than sober you want to run through it for me slid a she a she I slit the slid she IIT we'll try that again Saturday night after you've had a littleit drink go so thanks a lot for taking time while you're at work and uh we'll see you Saturday uh noon sharp okay okay Dave delorier is another driver with a real interest in cars and displays his current set of Wheels in front of a friend service station Dave is 19 and works at a local manufacturing plant recently lost my license for a few days how did you manage to pull that not for DWI I hope oh speeding violation when did you get the speeding violation last November I certainly took the time about picking up your license didn't they I guess they wanted to wait till near vacation time so try to blow my plan just to make it a little more convenient for you well let's see you were going to drink what beer stick with uh seum 7 seum s and what do you got to mix with I think I'll stick uh water nice and yeah this quite a set of wheels you got here well take a look at the engine we have this you'd rather run this around than the state car I would like to uh running a little bit more horsepower 350 hor in this engine for just a 383 what do you get for gas mileage about 14 on the interstate and about six in the city six in the city six in the city it's not almost like my blazer right but it runs a little bit faster well David we're going to try uh you know when we stop people on the road we ask for some tongue twisters and I want to try one on you now and then we'll try it again Saturday night see how you do let me hear you say around the rugged Rock the Ragged Rascal Ram around the rugged Rock the Ragged Rascal Ram that's pretty good we'll try again Saturday night Sue Frank Dave Joe and Roger come early on Saturday to practice the course in front of empty stands all right Susan we're going to be running these cones over here first in the serpentine you come through there now after you get some practice you'll be able to do it in about 25 seconds through to where that Gap then you take this decreasing radius curve into that simulated garage while we're giving Sue and the others a few practice runs let's take a look at the course the course begins with a series of sharp curves called the serpentine traffic cones Mark each side and the course is especially tough because of the slant of the track the cones are set 9 ft apart and allow only 1T of clearance on either side of the car the winding Serpentine ends with a decreasing radius curve into a simulated garage on the infield the driver must stop with his front bumper 1T from the cones at the end of the garage then he must back out through the curve and stop in position to begin the high-speed Lane change it's possible to complete this much of the course in 45 seconds or less then on a given signal the driver rapidly accelerates to 30 mph when his bumper reaches the first set of cones he's given a command on the track's loudspeaker system and by the flagman to go either left or right he then must swerve into the proper lane without hitting any of the cones or large boxes marking the left and right traffic Lanes a State Trooper rides with a driver on all runs practice is over it's time to measure each person's driving ability in the drive dry runs before he becomes impaired by alcohol here's how the scoring Works a driver will lose one point for each cone or box knocked down and one point for each second over the 45 second standard for completing the first part of the course in the high-speed Lane change a driver will lose five points if he either hits his brakes or goes into the wrong lane drivers can gain points too if they complete the first part of the course in less than 45 seconds they gain one point point for each second under the standard 45 we'll check the dry run score shortly now comes the fun part faite you can't show that though Dave uh had Aus on his first score run each driver had three dry runs and an average score has been computed the standings look like this Dave has the best score with a minus two followed by Roger with a minus 4 Frank with a minus5 Joe with minus 7 and Sue with -22 car numbers 1 through five are assigned to the drivers according to these standings Aus third each volunteer's alcohol intake is carefully measured and plotted so that the first wet runs just before race time will be made with a blood alcohol concentration of about 05% or about 1/ half of the state's legal limit of .1% BAC with a stand spilling rapidly the first wet runs are made on the first wet run Dave has about four drinks in his bloodstream with a blood alcohol concentration of 006 and an average score for two passes through the course ofus 6 compared with his dry score of minus [Music] two [Music] because Roger is pretty light the four drinks in his bloodstream put him up to a BAC of 09 and his score jumps to Aus 26 compared to the dry score of-4 prank at 006 shows a slight loss of driving skill with a score of minus 6 right Joe with a BAC of 005 has exactly the same score as on his dry run a - 7 and Su score drops to a minus 28 with three drinks and a BAC of 06 right except for Roger who BAC shot up to 09 our drivers show little loss of driving skills on our first web run they have bac's about 05 the point where most normal social drinkers call it quits and stay out of trouble on the highway after these runs during the first series of races the drinking begins in Earnest and the volunteers begin showing signs of alcohol impairment a killer on me if I had to do from here it looks like it comes kind of fast yes it does it does because it doesn't sound like he's doing it until about 2 Ines before you get to them things that I thought was I did man the camera is right there going around and I just boom right through it I love it the rest will do a lot worse how many more do you have uh I've had one since the last time going to have another one probably before I get out there again but I think the rest are going to start catching up and I don't think they're going to do as good teric need another boiler maker another boiler maker we'll arrange it very soon I'm still uh sipping on that number one job but I could use the number two job okay how do you think you're going to do uh do you think you can get we can get you up to point 2 uh hope to reach 35 you're going to try for 35 right and wind up backing out of the snowbank again Dave's a point ahead of me but we're going to catch him okay all right and you think you're going to drive just as well uh I drove better I think on the wet runs TimeWise going through the S's and uh except that you knocked down more cones no I didn't yes you did your score was worse it was oh well Joe you did you did the same as you did last time uh the first time but you're only 05 you're working on a little bit more now you think yeah this is about my 67th one already I'm I'm working on it okay well we don't want you to to to let us down you know expect to get a nice high blood alcohol I'm trying yeah you don't want any of these uh these City fellas to to get a higher blood alcohol concentration than you do no this is almost empty I'll go on another one right now okay want would you like to little add a little something to it or well don't make me no difference I don't care I see you want to try that tongue twister for me again Betty B but the B was so he did it okay you want to try around the rugged Rock the Ragged Ras R around the rugged Rock the red Rascal ran red Ras oh it wasn't the red rasal they go to uh like this garage they have a whole new paint um in a week and they come back and you know they're all like number 77 he go through once a week he has a p job right and he comes back and he all sparking new like nothing happen does he ever win any races no I see in addition to recording the number of drinks consumed each participant's actual BAC is taken on a breathalyzer prior to the wet run all tests are supervised by the state police it's intermission just before the feature race of the evening the stands are packed and our five drinking drivers take to the track first we have Dave at .13 with eight beers under his belt Dave's dry score shows he's a good driver but with Aus 12 12 average on these second wet runs he does six times worse with this much [Music] [Applause] [Music] alcohol on the other hand Roger another Beer Drinker does a little better than he did on the first wet run when his BAC was 09 still with a BAC of .12 his score of -2 is five times worse than his dry score of [Applause] -4 Frank drinking boiler makers with a BAC of .13 scores A-1 19 three times worse than a score of-5 [Applause] left Joe drives with the highest BAC of all at14 and gets a minus 16 while Su on tequila has the most colorful ride [Music] [Applause] [Music] up [Music] [Applause] of course there's always a morning after but this one's a little different because we have newsreel footage of the night before most of our drivers still felt they performed rather well verify when you start to react you react a little bit late and then you overreact you can't get back in line fast enough watch this one the time before when you hit clip the right side of the Combs coming in the lane change the garage [Laughter] out I took the wrong I took the wrong lane for you got back on the track though I was somebody else's course wow what to the wall must laughing straight now that you've seen the runs and we've told you the score in the ranking anybody dat us to the positions to the scoring to your ability so it was I myself thought I did better on the first wet runs than I did on the dry runs but it shows up that I didn't you didn't do that bad on your first wet runs but you were only at an 06 and I remind you that's just the starting of impairment that wasn't uh I felt a lot more uncomfortable driving at 06 something you should have learned about yourselves and alcohol not the driving part of it once you get under the influence of alcohol and influence is after four or five drinks then the alcohol takes over you remember doing as poorly as it looked on those films thought I was doing better I thought when I went through that last run I thought I made it perfect but I knocked down a whole side it didn't and you didn't see them no I thought I did it you know I thought I went right through and didn't not D in the cones but I guess I did when I went through it and I wiped him out I didn't feel it and I asked the cop and he said he didn't feel it either but he was just going along with me this cuz I didn't I felt one that was it all the rest must have just been smooth I felt it but I didn't believe it sort of numb on the on the last wet run I uh I wasn't back at David David went first and I had thoughts that I wanted to beat him to get a better score and then I had thoughts why don't I do something nice for the crowd and and tag the wall but now would you have driven home under Ser similar uh alcohol drinking experiences had you not been out of Cam mou and not been demonstrating you can't drink and drive yeah definitely cuz I always think that I'm more so than I am or that I can hold more Bo definitely too I don't know probably I think so Joe I would have you would have driven home yeah give a choice of a taxi or a car your car probably would have driven and a can of beer Sue Joe Dave Roger Frank each of our five drinking drivers as an individual quite a different person but in one way they're all alike when they get too much alcohol in their systems and get behind the wheel they're dangerous they didn't know they hid all those cones until they saw the news film as we just saw if they had driven home they could have been in a different kind of news reel the kind we see all too often of the Carnage on our highways fortunately all they hit were a few traffic cones and boxes not cars or people in fact all of us who drink and drive are alike in this respect combine too many drinks with an automobile and were a menace on the track or on the road few of us could have done any better than our five drinking [Music] drivers