Calling in on drunks on the road

[smfcpacfp]

I have always felt that we should adopt the Iranian punishment for driving drunk - summary execution on the spot. Oh, but that would be too harsh cry the drunks and knee jerk liberals.

If the did that the first few times a drunk was caught, I can assure you it would stop all but the most suicidal drunk drivers. Or you might face the situation they face in Holland where the penalty is permanent loss of driving privileges so you have to watch out carefully when driving for drunks on the sides of roads walking (staggering) home and sometimes falling in the roadway.

As a minimum the drunk driver should forfeit his car to the government, irrespective of who the owner is or what liens exist on the car.

As a young man I rove drunk on more than one occassion. With the thought of summary execution on the spot, I definitely would not have.

 

[Chuck52]

As a young man I rove drunk on more than one occassion. With the thought of summary execution on the spot, I definitely would not have.

It would be a cheap shot to comment that you seem averse to giving others the leniency you enjoyed, but how about we just ponder who gets to define "drunk"?

Chuck

 

[rjkobbeman]

It would be a cheap shot to comment that you seem averse to giving others the leniency you enjoyed, but how about we just ponder who gets to define "drunk"?

Chuck

Exactly. Touchy subject. Anyone who claims that .08 is stupid gets labeled a drunk.

 

[dmccarty]

The state defines what BAC is unacceptable.

BAC is effected by weight. For me to get at .08 I have to drink 5-6 average US beers in ONE hour. I should not be around any machinery after pounding down a six pack in 60 minutes.

A male can process one ounce of alcohol an hour. Women are a bit less. And since women weigh on average less than men this means they get drunk quicker.

If I drink one beer an hour I can drink all day and not get drunk. But at some point all I would be doing is getting rid of beer....

But if I drink TWO beers in a hour things get interesting....

After the first hour I have one beer in my system. I drank two but the body got rid of one.

At the end of hour two I have drunk a total of four beers in two hours. I now have two beers in my system. Two beers have been processed.

After hour three I have had six beers, three are gone but three remain.

So if I start drinking at the BBQ at noon and ONLY drink two beers an hour by 6:00pm I am at .08. If I have a couple for the road and leave at 7:00 pm I am well over .08.

If I was drinking three beers an hour you just get to Drunk Land that much faster.

The acceptable level for a BAC for a CDL is lower than .08.

A BAC .08 is a good compromise number. But one is impaired well before one gets to .08 BAC.

Later,
Dan

 

[300UGUY]

The state defines what BAC is unacceptable.

BAC is effected by weight. For me to get at .08 I have to drink 5-6 average US beers in ONE hour. I should not be around any machinery after pounding down a six pack in 60 minutes.

A male can process one ounce of alcohol an hour. Women are a bit less. And since women weigh on average less than men this means they get drunk quicker.

If I drink one beer an hour I can drink all day and not get drunk. But at some point all I would be doing is getting rid of beer....

But if I drink TWO beers in a hour things get interesting....

After the first hour I have one beer in my system. I drank two but the body got rid of one.

At the end of hour two I have drunk a total of four beers in two hours. I now have two beers in my system. Two beers have been processed.

After hour three I have had six beers, three are gone but three remain.

So if I start drinking at the BBQ at noon and ONLY drink two beers an hour by 6:00pm I am at .08. If I have a couple for the road and leave at 7:00 pm I am well over .08.

If I was drinking three beers an hour you just get to Drunk Land that much faster.

The acceptable level for a BAC for a CDL is lower than .08.

A BAC .08 is a good compromise number. But one is impaired well before one gets to .08 BAC.

Later,
Dan

Back in the day, I'd drink a 12 pack. Then go to the bar. Really lucky that I never had an accident.

 

[polo1665]

The state defines what BAC is unacceptable.

BAC is effected by weight. For me to get at .08 I have to drink 5-6 average US beers in ONE hour. I should not be around any machinery after pounding down a six pack in 60 minutes.

A male can process one ounce of alcohol an hour. Women are a bit less. And since women weigh on average less than men this means they get drunk quicker.

If I drink one beer an hour I can drink all day and not get drunk. But at some point all I would be doing is getting rid of beer....

But if I drink TWO beers in a hour things get interesting....

After the first hour I have one beer in my system. I drank two but the body got rid of one.

At the end of hour two I have drunk a total of four beers in two hours. I now have two beers in my system. Two beers have been processed.

After hour three I have had six beers, three are gone but three remain.

So if I start drinking at the BBQ at noon and ONLY drink two beers an hour by 6:00pm I am at .08. If I have a couple for the road and leave at 7:00 pm I am well over .08.

If I was drinking three beers an hour you just get to Drunk Land that much faster.

The acceptable level for a BAC for a CDL is lower than .08.

A BAC .08 is a good compromise number. But one is impaired well before one gets to .08 BAC.

Later,
Dan

I was gonna cry "bull" when I first read your post. I thought better of it though, and looked it up on a BAC calculator. Guess what, you're right
I had always thought or been told that a beer an hour had the result of keeping you right on the limit. When I read 5 or 6 beers in an hour I had to look it up. Makes sense that it is the first hour and subsequent beers have a piling on effect. Good explanation:thumbsup:

Mark

 

[dmccarty]

... When I read 5 or 6 beers in an hour I had to look it up. Makes sense that it is the first hour and subsequent beers have a piling on effect. Good explanation:thumbsup:

And dont forget your weight counts. When I was growing up the legal age to drink was 18. At that time you could drive with a .10 BAC! I don't exactly remember my weight back then but it was maybe 170-180? A six pack in a hour would put me at .10 but I would be legal.

There ain't no way I should have been driving but I was legal.

Later,
Dan

 

[Bird]

At one of the seminars I attended, they had the "official" breathalyzer and an experimental small handheld unit that was being tested. I drank 4 beers in about an hour and a half (that was fast drinking for me) and then blew .04 on each of the machines (I could never break the habit of calling it a "machine" because it always upset our departmental expert chemist who would always remind anyone who called it a machine that it was not a machine; it was an "instrument".):laughing:

And when the legal limit was less than .10 (.10 being enough to be prima facie evidence of intoxication), our departmental policy was to not charge anyone who did not register .11 or more. So we released people at .09 and .10 even though there was no doubt that they were "impaired".

 

[nap61]

Dan,
You are right that the states set the BAC limit for DWI. However, all states now use .08; not because they all think alike but because the Feds have this neat little trick that they use to get the states to fall in line. "If you want Fed highway funds, you have to use the BAC that we dictate." That "carrot/stick" approach has been used in other situations as well. I am not trying to be political, just stating the facts of life in dealing with the Feds.

Norm

 

[nap61]

Bird,
All intoxilyzer "machines" have a margin of error. That figure is recorded on the certificate each time the machine is re-calibrated. But, in Louisiana, before a PO can ask a subject to take the breath test, he/she must be under arrest for DWI. I have never seen anyone "un-arrested" if they blow under the limit. It might help them in court, but they still take the ride.

Norm