DA: Thirst for death

I realize The Great One has verified this, but I'm having a bit of trouble with the story itself.

THIRST FOR DEATH

(18 January 2001, New Zealand) The west coast of New Zealand is threaded with narrow, windy roads that climb and descend the hills at improbable angles. A Christchurch driver with little patience for those dangerous curves was preparing a hot cup of tea in her car when she learned one last lesson about respect for the road.
Nothing, but nothing, could keep her from her afternoon tea that day. Well all right, one thing could keep her from her tea. Karma. While she was trying to brew a cuppa, her car plunged over a precipice and into a creek. The woman was found dead three days later, still holding a box of teabags, with a mug wedged against the steering wheel and a thermos of hot water beneath her feet.

There were no brake marks on the road.

Submitted by: Tamsin Braisher
Reference: The New Zealand Press

First, and most obvious, the thermos kept the water hot for three days?  Where can I buy one that works so well?  While the story fails to mention if the creek had running water, I would have to assume so.  Said water would naturally be cold, thus cooling the thermos long before she was found.

Second, if the fall and subsequent impact was strong enough to kill the woman, I doubt she'd still be holding the box of tea bags.  Consider too, knowing the force a frontal impact generates, her body would have been slammed against the steering wheel and mug, most likely shattering the mug and deforming the steering wheel.

Just some thoughts.

I have to agree with the reservations stated above.  This reads like an elaborated tale (details added to make it juicier), but the details tend to add a veneer of UNbelievability to the story.

If the only doubt that exists here is that pertaining to the thermos, behold.....modern technolgy has provided for the thermos that is lined with stainless steel, not glass. Having two or three of them myself, I can vouch for their efficiency in keeping the water warm, if not hot. And, they can take a bit of abuse. I've dropped mine countless times on camping trips and other events. The outside gets pretty banged up, but the inside is still intact.

As to the victim still holding the box of tea bags...stranger things have happened... :sneaky

Thermos factor does not kill this story.  I think that the article using the term "thermos of hot water" could simply be an assumption or mis-perception of the article writer.

For example, the old joke:
If you spell the word most, MOST, and you spell the word host, HOST, then how do you spell the word of what you put into the TOASTER?

Most people say T-O-A-S-T, when the answer is actually B-R-E-A-D....

What I am saying is:  if you came across a crash scene with a teabag, a saucer & cup, and a thermos, you might describe it as a "thermos of hot water" because a "thermos of hot water" is normally associated with the other items.

AsDart mentioned, basically a true story with too many writer's embellishments.

BCE

This is for clarification only and not attacking either of the prior posters.

There are actually THREE questions brought up by the wording in the article:

1 - The thermos containing "hot" water after sitting for THREE days.  The ability of a thermos to survive the fall is not really a consideration due to, as already mentioned by Woodsman, the use of steel in newer models.

2 - The victim holding onto a box of teabags after an OFF-ROAD collision forceful enough to kill her.

3 - The presence of an apparently unbroken coffee cup wedged against the steering wheel.

                                                                                       

The question here becomes: What actually killed her?  

Key point - she was still in the vehicle which means that she was instantly rendered unable to move.  

If she was still correctly in her seat then her seat belt successfully restrained her and the force killing her would have to been acting solely on her head&neck and other free portions of her body (including her arms and hands).  This scenario is VERY unlikely as her hand flying about would be very likely to bang into some area of the interior causing her to lose her grip.  :???
If, however, her seatbelt failed and allowed her to be driven onto the steering column by the force of collision, then why is the mug identified as being wedged against the steering wheel (what could be the other side of the wedge if not her breastbone); the thing should have been just as shattered as her breast bone.  :???

As I said above, the story COULD be true but the embellishments lend an air of unbelievability to it.

1. Wedgies cup in steering wheel
2. Pulls out bags for brew
3. Goes over cliff
4. Survives but has fatal heart attack

Sound convincing??

maybe the mug was originally in her hand, wedged against the steering wheel, the teabags in her other hand. trying to get one into the other, she goes over the edge, slams into the bottom of the creek which smashes the front of her car, knocking her head to bits, pieces of glass kills etc. the box still in her hand as she clutched it in fright.

Anything is possible, but some things aren't probable. I'd say we wait for more info.If it's true, i'd say she gets a DA.
Demon

I don't think we need to know that info.  Here's my thought:
-we can pretty much rule out most sudden medical phenomna like heart attack, stroke, siezure, annurism, etc. because she was still holding the box of tea bags.  Had one of these events occured, she would have dropped the box
-we can deduce from the description of the road that the height was sufficient to meet any requirement you're thinking of
-water was not especially deep.  Probably didn't actually make it into the car, or the thermos would have floated off (depending on what type of thermos it was) along with the cup, and the box would not be recognizable after three days in water.  It would be safe to rule out drowning or hypothermia as possible cause of death

I'd guess she knocked her head on the steering wheel or died of shock after hitting the bottom (probably the latter).

We don't need to know why people went looking for her, how they finally found her, or exactly how she died.  To give it a , all we need to know is:
1) Subject is incapable of reproduction (she is dead)
2) Subject made an astounding misapplication of judgement (making a cup of tea while driving on a high, winding road, and not even hitting the brakes before she went over
3) Subject was the cause of subject's own demise (she was the only one in the car)
4) Subject was mature (adult woman, sounds mature to me)
5) Story is true (verified be Darwin)

It originaly was classed as a Darwin for those reason I reckon Shadow, but I thought this thread was about weeding out some of the incorrect facts. I would have thought we need to know the drop to know if she could have been found by a passing motorist. If she was found by a motorist and not, let's says, missing persons, how would they know how long she had been there? That leds us back to the thermos of hot water.

The points you made about 'how she was found' and 'why she was found' I had meant as the same question that I have explained above. I'm sorry, my fault, I will have to be clearer in future.

We need to know how she died because... well I know there was a reason when I posted it, I just can't think of it right now. I will post it when I remember. But you're probably right about the death anyway.

Sorry for not making myself clearer, I still have a lot to learn from the rest of you.  :|  

Spent some time digging in to this one last night( this morning ). Found out that the Archives of the New Zealand Press are 'pay-per-view' over the internet, decided I wasn't that richcurious. By that time I could see from the list at the bottom of the DAF Index that ALL of our members from Down Under were signed in (Well 5 or 6 of them anyway), a good sign that it was time for Greywarden to go to sleep.

I think it likely that Darwin likely verified the story before it ended up buried in the archives, perhaps we should ask her when she gets back from vacation.

Gosh I can't remember now why I called this one confirmed. It's usually because I've verified the URL. I'll check on it, and if that wasn't the case, I'll change it to unconfirmed. I might have embellished the story as far as the "hot thermos of water" but I try my best to accurately report the facts in as humorous a manner as possible, so I know for sure I didn't intentionally invent anything. Thanks for the feedback!

-Darwin

It doesn't feel true, anyone who spends time driving on mountain roads wakes up early to the fact that care is needed to make to your destination, rocks have a habit of falling onto roads whenever they feel like it and if your not watching what you are doing and if you are luckly, you end up with a wrecked car.

Just another thought, Christchurch is pretty flat, and the roads are mainly flat and straight.

Most of the real windy roads are up in the mountains, like the southern alps or on the west coast. of the south island. or back country roads.

I find it a bit hard to believe that a Christchurch woman was in such a hurry that that she had to prepare her coffee on the run while driving about on the west coast?

What is there to hurry for in the west coast, its a (mainly) laid back rural area, and the main reason for going there is tourism, logging, or farming.
So really there is no good reason that you cant stop in a lay-by and spend five minutes drinking your coffee and enjoying a bit of a view.

(Plus I dont recall seing this article and I read the main NZ papers every day)

A big from me.

Hmmm... I can't figure out why I called it confirmed!
All I can find is this information:

DA: Thirst for Death
Date: Tue, 10 Apr 2001 23:16:08 -0700
From: Tamsin Braisher
Reference: The New Zealand Press
Deceased: Theby Pamela Caukwell, 59

The following is an article from the March 22 2001 issue of the New Zealand national newspaper “The New Zealand Press”. Although written in a restrained style, I think the stupidity of the driver (a woman...shameful) is obvious. If you require any documention for proof, I would happy to try to track down court records etc. All the towns mentioned are on the West Coast of New Zealand. (The stupidity becomes even greater when you realise that all the roads in this region are narrow, often steep, very windy...)

“Preparing a cup of tea while driving cost a Christchurch woman her life.

Theby Pamela Caukwell, 59, was still holding a box of tea bags when she was found dead in her Honda car in Red Creek, near Maruia, Buller, on January 18. Police found a mug wedged between the dashboard and the steering wheel, and a thermos downstream.

Westport Coroner Peter Roswell told an inquest yesterday that he found Mrs Caukwell suffered extensive head and facial injuries and was knocked unconscious before she drowned. She also had chest injuries. Mrs Caukwell had been holidaying with her daughter in Motueka and was driving back to Christchurch when the crash occurred.

The car was hidden by unusually high water levels and was only noticed three days later when foreign cyclists saw it and told a Murchison retailer, who reported it to police. Mrs Caukwell's body was only found when the car was removed from the creek. The victim was wearing her seatbelt but had the diagonal strap under her right arm, apparently to give her greater movement to prepare tea.

The car had gone off the road before a creek bridge, travelled 10m before hitting the far bank, and flipped backwards into the creek. There were no brake marks.”

I'll contact the submitter for more information.

well i have heard worse to be true but i dont know if i can trust the TV set to not embellish something almost as i can keep my dog from eating my spagetti...the bastard,its that sad, really....another day another story but if it wasnt embellished would it have caught any ones eye

with out the juciy details the human race would only see a death

gives you something to think about at night

Westport Coroner Peter Roswell told an inquest yesterday that he found Mrs Caukwell suffered extensive head and facial injuries and was knocked unconscious before she drowned. She also had chest injuries. Mrs Caukwell had been holidaying with her daughter in Motueka and was driving back to Christchurch when the crash occurred.

Ok, if you were in a hurry, the best way to travel back to Christchurch from Motueka would be via Blenheim. (safer and faster roads, where you can get a higher average speed, but a little bit longer on paper)
If she went that way, why would the Westport coroner be called in, as there are others closer?

The other way to travel back to Christchurch would be through Springs Creek and down to Hamner Springs, a quicker route on paper, but a lot more windy as it goes through the northern part of the southern alps.
If the crash occured near the middle of the journey then the westport coroner may be called in instead of the Blenheim or Picton coroner.

Can anyone supply details on where the crash occured? this will help with its validity.
If she traveled along the second option then I'll change my mind, and say it's a very plausable story.