All participants in the scene were wearing headset microphones so that the audience of high school students could hear what was being said.
“We have asystole. Patient is deceased,” called out one paramedic.
“What?! He’s dead?!” cried a passenger.
“What? I didn’t mean to!” said Godin, who was promptly approached by Constable Katherine Muir of Turtle Mountain RCMP.
Muir led Godin through a breathalyzer test, which he failed. She then read him his rights and told him he was being arrested for impaired driving causing death before putting him in handcuffs and detaining him in the back of the police vehicle.
Meanwhile, fire crews had extraction tools at the ready and made sure that the vehicle was safe, as EMS loaded a passenger with a neck injury into the ambulance.
Once the victim was declared deceased on-scene, Wheatland Funeral Service arrived with a hearse to collect the body.
The student on-lookers were mostly silent as the scene unfolded before them.
“I think it’s important to do these mock crashes to help students visualize it,” said Muir afterwards. “You hear stories about this stuff, but seeing your classmate in this situation really strikes a chord.”
Once the scene was cleared by emergency professionals, students filed into the gym for a presentation.
Danielle Lewis, organizer, along with her sister Hilary Renwick, told students the story of their other sister Taylor Renwick, who was killed by a drunk driver.
“How many of you have siblings? Raise your hand. Okay, just think about your siblings now. Taylor was on her way home to spend Thanksgiving with her family when she was hit and killed by a drunk driver,” said Renwick.
“My sister was put into a body bag, like the one you guys just saw Grey put into. The difference between Grey and Taylor? My sister never got to come home. When I was in Grade 12, the same age as some of you, I had to see my older sister in a coffin because someone chose to drink and drive.”
“Driving impaired is not a mistake. It’s not an accident. It’s a choice; a choice that I’m telling all of you to never make,” Lewis went on to say. “Do not drive your car if you’re impaired. Do not get in the car with someone that is impaired. If you know that someone is impaired and you can’t get their keys from them, call the RCMP. Do not drive impaired, it ends lives.”
According to MADD, young people have the highest rates of traffic death and injury per capita among all age groups and the highest death rate per kilometre driven among all drivers under the age of 75, and more 19-year-olds (those who may have just begun trying drugs and alcohol legally) die or are seriously injured than any other age group.
This makes road and other crash deaths the leading cause of death for young people between the ages of 15 and 24, at least in 2022.
Just under half (45%) of fatally injured drivers between the ages of 16 and 19 tested positive for drugs between 2017 and 2021, and in the 20 to 34 age group, that number goes up to almost two-thirds (61%).
“Unfortunately, this is still happening all the time, especially in rural areas,” said Lewis. “Kids this age are the riskiest group, so we need to bring awareness.”
by JACQUIE MAYNARD
Recorder staff