Coroner suggests flags for mobility scooters

Mobility scooters should have flags fitted for visibility, a coroner says, following the death of a 77-year-old woman who was hit by a car while crossing a Christchurch street.

Mavis Kathleen Murphy died in Christchurch Hospital on October 23, 2008, after being hit as she drove her scooter across Clarence St, Riccarton, two days earlier.

Police told regional coroner Richard McElrea thatMurphy crossed "without checking for traffic ... at a fast pace".

The driver of a southbound car managed to avoid her.

The driver said Murphy was "totally oblivious" to having nearly been hit.

Police said Murphy "carried on at speed across the centre-line and into the path of a vehicle travelling northward".

The driver of the first car called out to her but she was hit by a northbound Toyota, throwing her from her scooter and causing severe injuries.

The driver of the first car told police the Toyota "certainly was not exceeding the speed limit".

Murphy died in hospital from severe head injuries.

Her daughter, Susan Gorton, told police her mother had owned the secondhand scooter for three years, and she was not aware of any other accidents.

Her mother was "mentally alert".

The coroner said there was "no evidence to suggest death was other than accidental".

A pathologist noted a recent heart attack that Gorton and the coroner suggested may have accounted for her lack of attention.

The coroner's findings said between 2000 and 2007 there were nine deaths involving mobility scooters in New Zealand.

Seven of the deaths were from collisions with motor vehicles.

The coroner recommended the Ministry of Transport consider educating mobility-scooter users on their safe operation, particularly when crossing the road.

"Further, that the Ministry of Transport consider any means of enhancing the safe use of mobility scooters by, for example, the use of a brightly coloured flag at the rear of the scooter."

Mobility-scooter wholesaler Dean Williamson told The Press that flags were an option but were not compulsory.

Retailers normally recommended people have them fitted, he said.

- © Fairfax NZ News