>> Greg's story
So you know how to drive a car? But that doesn't make you a good driver.
Experience, anticipation and the ability to see the consequences of your actions, makes you a good driver. Greg’s niece was a very inexperienced newly qualified driver; she tragically lost her life in a road crash. In fact Greg was the sole survivor of the collision which also killed his wife and son who were all passengers in the car. Greg was cut from the wreckage and sustained serious injuries.
Do you think you’re a good driver, have you gained enough experience and skills?
>> Transcript
I past my driving test without any minors or without any problems with it, so yeah, I think I’m pretty good.
I’ve never crashed or anything.
- You don’t exactly keep your eyes on the road all the time either!
I think I’m a good driver because I stay to the speed limit.
What I think makes a good driver is skill. Lots of skill.
Your attitude towards driving does change if you’re carrying passengers. You’re more easily distracted.
Drivers that go too slow annoy me.
Speed limits are far too slow.
My thing’s on speed limits ‘cause I think they’re rubbish.
- Nobody even abides by them.
Some older drivers are better. It probably gets worse with age.
I think the speed limits are too low to be honest. You’ve got 20mph. You might as well run faster.
Your car gives you your image. The better your car, the better you are going to look to everyone else.
My name is Greg Hensman, I come from Market Harborough in Leicestershire.
On the day of the accident, I should have been driving myself but unfortunately my car had been taken into the garage to have repairs on it.
My niece had just done a five-day intensive driving course and passed that. Sort of learn to drive in 5 days.
She wasn’t working on the day of the accident so she said: As your car is in the garage uncle Greg, I will drive you there.
Driving back home, I was sat in the back of a Renault Clio, talking to my son and my niece was sitting in the front with my wife, discussing her wedding plans.
And then for no apparent reason she decided to overtake this blue Ford Sierra that was travelling along the road.
As she got level with the Ford Sierra, there was a white HGV lorry coming the other way. I think because of a lack of experience, she didn’t know what to do.
Rather than braking, trying to pull back in, she carried on accelerating and the HGV wagon just drove straight in to us.
I must have got knocked unconscious for a few second. I remember coming to. Suddenly looked around me and saw my niece impaled on the steering wheel.
My main concern was my son next to me, being the youngest member in the car crash. He had really erratic breathing; he got a real rasp to his breath.
I sort of kept shouting at my wife but she wasn’t answering me.
Once the fire brigade came and started removing people from the car, they spent a lot of time with my niece and then it was a matter of: No. She’s gone, we can’t do anything.
They took my son out, assured me he was fine, he was going to be OK. He was conscious so he was going to be OK.
Then they proceeded to start and try to cut away the wreckage to try and get myself out.
After the blanket went over my niece and the fire brigade said: That’s it, we can’t do anything for her.
I was pretty numb. It’s a matter of I sat there thinking: God, she’s died. My 19 year old niece who is supposed to be getting married in a few weeks’ time. She is supposed to be doing me a favour today and now she is dead.
When I sort of got into hospital, I had an operation. I perforated my liver, tore my intestines, ruptured my spleen and had various broken bones.
The following day the surgeon came in to tell me what happened to me, that I was in ICU.
Then he went on to say that the other members of the family in the car had unfortunately been killed.
I came out of hospital, had my rest and recuperation for about four weeks and then went home to the family.
Although the internal injuries were getting better, I still had the mental scars, which I had never even thought of. I then started to have night terrors.
I could be sat on the sofa, watching the TV and all of a sudden my son was sitting next to me as he was in the car crash.
I ended up having to go to an inquest to find out what exactly had happened to everybody in the accident.
I was originally told that my son had had a heart attack, to find out afterwards that he hadn’t had a heart attack but that he had actually broken his neck.
My wife was on a life support machine in the hospital. My wife’s mother had to make the decision to switch off the life support machine. She had massive brain injuries and, again, a broken neck and just about every bone in her body had been broken.
My niece was killed, they said it was instantly in the car. The steering wheel basically crushed her chest.
We spent all that time waiting for the inquest to find out exactly what their injuries were and why they had been killed.
My view on these five-day intensive driving courses is that young drivers shouldn’t do them because you gain no experience whatsoever. You have passed your test but you haven’t learned how to drive properly.
My sister doesn’t want to talk about it. She doesn’t want to put blame…she blamed the lorry driver at the time.
I have a feeling that she probably feels a bit like it is my fault in some way because my car was in the garage, the same as I did.
I think if you are a young driver, don’t let peer pressure get to you. I see a lot of kids driving around still and they can be fine driving on their own but they get mates in the car and for some reason go silly.
They want to drive faster and faster and a lot of it is peer pressure from the people in the car with them.
Don’t give in to peer pressure. Just say: No, I want to be here until I’m 80, not just for the next 8 minutes.
