A pensioner who accidentally hit the accelerator of her 300bhp electric vehicle and ploughed into parked cars has admitted careless driving
Mary McNie’s Hyundai was equipped with an automatic driver position setting, which activated as she pressed the start button after having manually moved her seat.
The unexpected adjustment caused her foot to come off the brake and hit the accelerator.
The car then shot forward, hitting another vehicle and causing a domino effect involving further cars, Inverness Sheriff Court heard.
Mrs McNie, 78, admitted a single charge of careless driving before Sheriff David Harvie.
Fiscal depute David Morton said the incident, in Tesco car park on Eastfield Way was “somewhat unfortunate”.
Mr Morton told the court it was around 6.30pm when Mrs McNie returned to her car after a shopping trip.
He said: “The vehicle was a Hyundai electric vehicle with 300 brake horsepower.
Due to an error on leaving the car park, Miss McNie pressed the accelerator firmly.
Car ‘accelerated extremely rapidly’
“Due to the brake horsepower, this has meant it has accelerated extremely rapidly forwards in the car park.
“This has caused it to collide with a number of other vehicles – one vehicle ahead which has dominoed with a number of vehicles.”
The court heard that police were called to the scene and Mrs McNie cooperated fully.
Mr Morton continued: “There is no suggestion that alcohol was a factor.
“Mercifully, all the other vehicles’ occupants were doing their shopping so there was no one in the vehicles.”
Solicitor John McColl, for McNie, told the court his client had moved her driver’s seat forward on arriving at the car park in order to retrieve and stow items that were underneath.
When she returned to the vehicle, she climbed into the driver’s seat, placed her foot on the brake and pressed the start button.
This had activated the vehicle’s automatic driver positioning system and the seat began to move with Mrs McNie in it.
“The seat started to move, that has caused her foot to come off the brake and go onto the accelerator. The car has shot forward about 40 yards then collided into the car.”
Accident was ‘quite unusual’
He told Sheriff Harvie: “This has been an accident, which has been caused by a set of circumstances which are quite unusual.
“She is relieved in the extreme that there were not more significant consequences.”
Mr MacColl conceded that his client, of Old Road, Rafford, had a previous conviction for careless driving and told the sheriff: “It involved a cyclist on a country road.”
He said McNie, who is “sharp as a tack” and had passed an eyesight test without issue, had voluntarily surrendered her licence following the crash and now hoped to reapply for it.
Sheriff Harvie said that Mrs McNie’s carelessness arose in not checking she was properly set up in the vehicle.
He said: “It is unusual. That combined with the high power of the vehicle has caused a very significant movement of over 40 yards and struck with some force.
“No one including yourself was hurt, and that is the positive.”
He endorsed her licence with five penalty points and fined her £520.
