A drink driver who launched her car in the air after failing to negotiate a roundabout has been sentenced for two driving offences. Source: Cambridgeshire Police
A drunken mother in Britain whose car flew four metres into the air after she smashed it into a concrete roundabout with her toddler in the back was jailed yesterday.
Tania Chikwature, 32, was more than three times the drink-drive limit when she lost control of her Nissan Qashqai asshe drove to a wake, a court heard.
The defendant drank vodka the night before and a vodka bottle was found in her car, according to prosecutor Corinne Soanders-Silk.
A lorry driver who witnessed the crash in December last year said he could not believe they had survived, and that the vehicle had cleared the roundabout and hit a tree before landing on its roof, reported the Daily Mail.
Tania Chikwature attempted to overtake a truck as she was approaching a roundabout.
Chikwature's 20-month-old son was unhurt in the crash which was captured on dashcam footage as she illegally overtook a lorry on the approach to a roundabout on the A606 in Peterborough.
The defendant sustained unspecified injuries. The full-time mother, from Coventry, had admitted drink-driving and dangerous driving at an earlier hearing.
District judge Ken Sheraton jailed her for 26 weeks and ordered a three-year driving ban at Peterborough Magistrates' Court.
He told the defendant: "It's only by luck and certainly by no judgment of yours that you're not here today facing far more serious charges, and you're fortunate that somebody didn't die in that accident."
Soanders-Silk said the defendant was seen overtaking an HGV on the wrong side of solid white lines. Lorry driver Richard Jones said in a written statement that he saw the car approaching 'at speed' and had to brake to allow it to pass.
"The car seemed out of control and from the speed it came past me I knew it wasn't making the roundabout," he said.
"I saw it veer right and mount the concrete roundabout. I remember thinking as it launched into the air, 'they're not going to make it'."
He said the car went four metres in the air. The toddler was freed from the vehicle by a passing motorist and Chikwature was freed by firefighters. The defendant refused to provide a breath sample at the scene, but agreed to give a blood sample four hours later in hospital. Police found she had 246mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood at the time of the incident. The legal limit is 80mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood.
Chikwature said she had been drinking vodka from 9pm to 1am the night before, but didn't feel drunk at 11.40am the next day, when the crash occurred.
