At 2:54 pm on 13 June 2021, a Toyota Coaster (VD1927) running on New Territories GMB Route 803 for Lee On Estate overturned after colliding with a private car jumping the light at the junction of Tai Chung Kiu Road, Sha Tin Wai Road and Sha Tin Rural Committee Road, resulting in the death of the driver of the minibus and injuries to seven persons.
Accident background[]
Tai Chung Kiu Road has a number of different light signals controlling the crossroads, the design of which has been criticised and traffic accidents often occur. The signal at the junction of Tai Chung Kiu Road and Sha Tin Heung Sze Wui Road where the incident occurred is a set of traffic light signals which consists of arrowheads and traffic lights. Taking the light signal at the incident location on Tai Chung Kiu Road in the direction of City One as an example, when the green light is on, vehicles turning left along Tai Chung Kiu Road, vehicles going straight ahead and vehicles turning right on Sha Tin Wai Road can pass through the light signal; on the contrary, when the arrowhead light is on, only vehicles turning left along Tai Chung Kiu Road can pass through the light signal.
Although the set of traffic signals can facilitate traffic diversion and remind motorists to take priority turns, traffic accidents have occurred many times due to motorists' misunderstanding of the light signals, such as the accident involving a minibus accident in Sha Tin in 2010 and the five-vehicle collision on Tai Chung Kiu Road in 2015, etc. At around 1pm on 4 June, nine days before the accident, an FTBCI FBC6120CRZ2 school bus lost control of its vehicle and crashed into a traffic light and a stone curb at the junction of Belair Garden and Fo Tan Road on Tai Chung Kiu Road, then crashed into a cycle track, affecting another private car. A total of 24 people, including two drivers and 22 schoolchildren, were injured in the accident, which occurred about one kilometre away.
The accident[]
At 2:54 p.m., a minibus driver surnamed Cheung, aged 57, was driving a Route 803 Toyota Coaster BZB70R minibus (VD1927) towards Lee On along Tai Chung Kiu Road in the direction of Ma On Shan, when it reached the junction of Tai Chung Kiu Road, Sha Tin Wai Road and Sha Tin Rural Committee Road, it was hit and overturned by a white Audi private car driven by a female driver Chi Yin-ni (池燕妮), aged 33, along Sha Tin Wai Road in the direction of Sha Tin Central. The windscreen on the front of the minibus was shattered and detached, while the front of the private car was seriously damaged, with airbags popping out.
A driver's car recorder captured the moment of the incident, showing that the white private car was travelling along Sha Tin Wai Road in the direction of Sha Tin Rural Committee Road when it reached the junction and intended to go straight ahead. At that time, only the left arrow light was on, which should only allow vehicles turning left onto Tai Chung Kiu Road towards Che Kung Temple to pass through. However, another black Maserati private car in front of the private car, driven by a female driver, Wong Ping (王萍, 30), suspected that it had misread the light signal and started to go straight towards Sha Tin Rural Committee Road, which the white private car did not realise. The white private car was unaware of the mistake and ran into a minibus travelling along Tai Chung Kiu Road in the direction of City One Shatin. The minibus was hit until it bounced off the road, turned 180 degrees to the left and skidded for about 10 metres. The front end of the white private car was also seriously damaged, while the black private car which first ran the lights ran away.
After the accident[]
After the accident, the driver of the minibus, surnamed Cheung, and a passenger, who had not fastened their seat belts, were thrown out of their seats and trapped. The driver of the minibus was thrown out of the vehicle and was crushed by the body of the minibus. It took the fire department 10 minutes to extricate the two people from the minibus, and the minibus driver was confirmed dead at the scene after the fire department and ambulance staff had to lift the minibus up with tools to rescue him. The other three male and four female minibus passengers were sent to Prince of Wales Hospital and Nethersole Hospital for treatment.
Police said they would investigate the incident to see if anyone failed to comply with the traffic signals, whether the driver fastened his seat belt and whether the seat belt was functioning properly, and were also looking for the whereabouts of the black private car that was the first to run the lights. The female driver of the white private car in question was arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving.[1] The driver of the black private car surrendered on the following day and was later arrested on suspicion of dangerous driving.[2]
Reactions and follow-ups[]
TD has subsequently fine-tuned the angle of the traffic lights and lampshades, and added shadow line road markings and temporary plastic poles to remind motorists to pay attention to the signals and reduce speed.[3]
Then Sha Tin District Councillor Michael Yung opined that there were a number of road design problems on Tai Chung Kiu Road and urged the department to conduct a large-scale review, including the installation of an additional set of safety islands for traffic lights and vehicle monitoring cameras to prevent drivers from misreading the light signals and exceeding the speed limit.
Experts and academics agreed that the coupled traffic light at the junction in question was indeed misleading, and identified five major problems with the design of Tai Chung Kiu Road, including the road being too wide for the carriageway, the danger of accidents being aggravated by excessively high speeds, insufficient buffer time for the yellow light, too short a period of time for the yellow light, and a review of the system of traffic black spots, etc. Some experts said bluntly that only a single set of traffic lights would be sufficient to prevent drivers from seeing the wrong signals and exceeding the speed limit. Some experts pointed out that merely installing temporary traffic bollards at junctions could not solve the problem at all, and urged the Transport Department (TD) to conduct a thorough study on the shortcomings of the design of the Tai Chung Bridge Road and prescribe the right remedies.[4]
TD installed additional safety islands at the junction to clearly segregate the left-turning and straight-away and right-turning traffic lanes, and erected additional traffic lights on the safety islands to indicate the left-turning or straight-away and right-turning traffic lanes for clearer visibility by motorists, which is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2021.[5]
The minibus involved in the accident was not repaired and was decommissioned. The following year, the minibus was found idling in the Yuen Long garage, and its licence plate and vehicle licence had been removed, leaving its whereabouts unknown. The quota of PLBs vacated after decommissioning will be replaced by newly licensed or second-hand PLBs in the future.
Judicial procedures[]
The female driver of the white Audi, Chi Yin-ni, and the female driver of the black Maserati, Wong Ping, who had run the lights in front of them, were sentenced on 8 November 2022 in front of District Judge G. Lam.[6][7]
The case stated that at approximately 2:00 p.m. on the day of the incident, Chi was driving his private car along Sha Tin Wai Road towards New Town Plaza when he stopped at the light, with a vehicle driven by Wong in front of him. At that time, the left turn signal had turned green, but the traffic light for straight ahead was still red. Wong followed the vehicle in front of her, while Chi followed her straight ahead, and collided with a green minibus at the intersection. The minibus rolled over and dragged to the left, and the driver was thrown out of the vehicle. The minibus driver was killed when his head was caught between the body of the minibus and the road surface; six passengers on board were also injured when they were thrown to the left side of the minibus. Six passengers on board were also injured when they were thrown to the left side of the minibus. The investigation revealed that none of them were wearing seat belts at the time of the incident. The driver of the minibus succumbed to his injuries and Chi was arrested at the scene, while Wong surrendered the following day.
Wong Ping, the driver of the black Maserati that led the light dash, pleaded guilty to one count of dangerous driving. Wong, who worked as a securities trader and has a husband who is a businessman on the mainland, pleaded that she ran the lights because she had misread the traffic signals on another road. The judge found that she did not intentionally jump the lights, and believed that if a serious incident had not ensued, her behaviour would normally be punished by a fine, and sentenced her to a fine of HK$10,000 and a six-month suspension of her licence.
The female driver of the white Audi, Chi Yin-ni, pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving and causing grievous bodily harm by dangerous driving. The background report stated that Chi was married, used to run a bridal shop, and had only passed her probationary driving period and obtained her full driving licence less than a week before the incident. After the incident, she was under fire from netizens and was diagnosed with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. The judge stated that there was no way to know what Chi was thinking at the time of the incident, but with the benefit of the doubt going to the defendant, he concluded that Chi may have been influenced by the car in front of her or interfered with by a passenger in the same car before she flashed the lights, and that she may have been misled into driving through the intersection accidentally. She was sentenced to 16 months' imprisonment and a five-year licence suspension, and would be required to re-take the test for the driving licence after his release from prison.
Related articles[]
- Tai Chung Kiu Road
- New Territories GMB Route 803
- 2010 Sha Tin minibus accident
- 2015 Tai Chung Kiu Road five-vehicle collision accident
- 2015 Kam Tin minibus accident
Notes and references[]
- ↑ 大涌橋路車禍｜女司機賣私家車 載買家試車變撞車 涉危駕被捕 (Tai Chung Kiu Road crash: Female driver who sold private car crashed and arrested for dangerous driving while carrying buyer for trial run), HK01, 13 Jun 2021.
- ↑ 大涌橋路車禍｜率先衝燈黑色私家車女司機涉危駕被捕 獲准保釋 (Tai Chung Kiu Road crash: Female driver who ran red lights first arrested for dangerous driving, bail allowed), HK01, 15 Jun 2021.
- ↑ 大涌橋路車禍｜運輸署三招補鑊 區議員指路面問題多促大規模檢視 (Tai Chung Kiu Road crash: 3 remedial measures adopted by Transport Department; DCs pointed out many problems on the road, urged for mass inspections), HK01, 1 Jul 2021.
- ↑ 交通危城｜孭仔燈易肇禍？ 大涌橋路寬闊、車速快構成五大危機 (Dangerous town for traffic: Coupled traffic lights easily cause accidents? Wide road and fast speed limits at Tai Chung Kiu Road caused 5 major problems), HK01, 27 Aug 2021.
- ↑ 大涌橋路十字路口易釀意外 運輸署將加設安全島 (TD to add safety island at the intersection easily causing accidents of Tai Chung Kiu Road), Oriental Daily News, 28 Jul 2021.
- ↑ 沙田大涌橋路1死7傷意外 承認危駕致死罪女司機判囚16個月 (Female driver admitted to dangerous driving causing death, jailed for 16 months for Tai Chung Kiu Road accident that killed 1 and injured 7), Oriental Daily News, 8 Nov 2022.
- ↑ 小巴司機大涌橋路車禍亡 衝燈司機罰款 尾隨肇事新牌司機囚16月 (Minibus driver died on scene, a fine for driver who rushed lights, 16-month jail term for trailing newbie driver in the Tai Chung Kiu Road crash), HK01, 8 Nov 2022.