A POOR decision on a wet night has cost a young driver $2000, a two-year disqualification and 200 hours of community service.
In Nowra Local Court, Jesse Symons, 19, of Ellenborough Place, Horsley pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing grievous bodily harm.
Police reported torrential rain, 20-metre visibility and an extremely slippery road on the night of February 10 last year.
At 10pm Symons had a passenger with him as he drove north along the Princes Highway at Bewong.
There was a milk truck in front of him and as he approached a sweeping left hand bend, Symons decided to overtake and crossed the double unbroken lines.
A car towing a trailer carrying several motorcycles was approaching him and veered to the left thinking Symons would get back behind the truck.
However Symons stayed where he was and the approaching car veered hard right.
With no time to avoid a crash, he hit the passenger side of Symons’ car which spun 90 degrees and went down an embankment, coming to rest between two trees.
Both drivers and Symons’ passenger were trapped in their cars and were eventually taken to Shoalhaven Hospital by ambulance.
Symons had a broken foot and wrist, lacerations to both knees and a cut above his left ear.
The driver of the other car was treated for a sore chest and broken big toe.
Symons’ passenger had facial abrasions, abdominal bruising, a fracture femur and a burst fracture to a vertebra – injuries which resulted in a six-week stay at St Georges Hospital.