Allegedly Drunk Driving Woman Escapes Injury

On November 22nd, roads all over the state of Michigan were slick with ice and slushy with churned up snow after a winter storm. It was the first real winter weather to hit the Mitten, and a frightening number of cars had to be towed out of ditches as a result. But for one woman in Waterford Township, the weather contributed to a hair-raising experience that she is lucky to have survived – a collision with a moving train.

Waterford Township Police were dispatched to the scene of an accident in suburban Detroit, just after midnight. Upon arrival, they discovered a green Jeep Liberty, the front end completely torn up, resting against the railroad crossing signal pole next to the tracks. The driver, it seems, had been unable to stop on the slick roads, and had slid right into a moving train.

The driver of the badly damaged jeep, a 21-year-old woman from Commerce Township, explained to the officers what had happened. Because the road was so slick, her vehicle had slid through the lowered crossing gate, and then right into the side of the moving train. The speed of the train whipped the vehicle around and caused it to collide with the crossing signal.

But the weather, as it turns out, wasn’t the only factor in the accident. The driver had apparently been drinking. So while the driver had a perfectly good explanation of what had happened, and it may well have happened in exactly the same way to a sober person given the road conditions, she was still arrested for drunk driving.

After her arrest, the driver was transported to the Oakland County Jail.  She has been charged with operating while intoxicated which, under Michigan law, is a misdemeanor punishable by up to 93 days in jail, with fines of up to $500.

Amazingly, the driver of the jeep was completely uninjured in the accident. And the train, which may have sustained some minor damage, was not pushed off the tracks or derailed. Given the circumstances, she is one very, very lucky young woman.