Friday Fallout: Another Crazy Florida Drunk Driving Story

Florida is one of those states that has more than its fair share of drunk drivers, and because of that you’ll hear more crazy drunk driving stories coming out of Florida than almost anywhere else.

The balmy climate and the fact that it’s a tourist destination seems to give it a constant vacation atmosphere, so it’s no surprise when drivers take the party from the patio to the wheels of their cars. What is surprising is what they choose to blame that decision on.

One driver in Gainesville decided to take a page from a science textbook after he was arrested for drunk driving. He crashed a car that belonged to a rental car company, and by doing so blocked an entire travel lane on a busy street. When questioned by the police as to how he ended up in that lane, he couldn’t recall. That might be because his blood alcohol concentration (BAC) was 0.233 at the time of arrest, more than double the legal limit of .08.

When he was given the results of his breath tests, he said, “I can’t argue with physics. Physics is physics.”

It might have been the alcohol affecting his reasoning skills, but it would be difficult to attribute the choice to drink and drive to something like physics. The study of matter and its motion through space and time, physics can explain things like energy and force, but it can’t explain why someone would drink alcohol, get behind the wheel of a car, and crash that car in the middle of the travel lane.

It’s just another one of Florida’s crazy drunk driving stories that will end with the offender receiving a fine, driver license suspension, and if a new bill passes all the way to the Governor’s office, an ignition interlock for every offender who decides to drink and drive.

All’s well doesn’t end well in this case, because this offender could also lose his job. He might have had insurance for that rental car, but the company he got it from was also his employer, and they might not look too kindly on the physics explanation or the drinking and driving on the job.

The Friday Fallout: Every Friday Guardian Interlock brings you a unique drunk driving case that demonstrates the impact of – or fallout from – drunk driving.