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Got this in the email...looks dodgy to me.. anyway,for ur Saturday reading pleasure http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/9352/...-his-own-death/

Caught the movie "Departures" (Okuribito) yesterday afternoon. One word...superb. And that from a movie which is essentially about death. Funny how death can teach us so smuch about life. The movie fully deserves the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar it just received. Japanese movie fans can catch the ever stoic Tsutomu Yamazaki in his role as the 'Jedi Master' to Masahiro Motoki's musician turned apprentice mortician. Ryoko Hirosue is luminescent as Mika, the supportive wife with unspoken fears, and Kimiko Yo rounds up the cast as the longsuffering secretary with secrets of her own. And the music! The subdued yet powerful score by Joe Hisaishi is a joy in itself, and works wonderfully to complement the movie's pace and mood. Try to go on a weekday, without too many philistine teenagers and NS boys just looking for some entertainment. But should you meet some as I did, they will not help being drawn into its narrative. The chatter around me quickly went silent as the theme of the movie, and its treatment of death and closure slowly but surely dawned on us. I think there was nary a dry eye in the theatre as the credits rolled. Watch it before it closes for lack of popularity, as is the wont of arthouse fare in Singapore. IMDB entry.

Hilarious!

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNew...ory_301826.html What a way to die RIP

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10...ress-train.html

We are just beginning to feel the heat of this meltdown. I doubt any bailout will have much of an effect, unless US is prepared to see its currency go to US1=SG$1 as they continue to print money or raise interest rates in a very difficult enviroment. They are experiencing what we have suffered in 1997 times 100, as their investment banks are highly leveraged 30x or more and they are dealing with a credit default swap market of 60 TRILLION! . Asian could export their way out of their financial crises to Euro & USA, but where can USA export to when even Europe is dire straits? China? Well maybe can export milk . What was the catalyst for this? The gung ho US consumer who spents more money than he makes buying big houses, consumer products and big cars fueled by easy credit. They have forgotten how to save $. They fuel their purchases by 2nd or 3rd mortgages on their property or using creditcard/loans etc. Sounds familiar huh? The 700 billion bailout represents just 5% of the outstanding mortgages of 14 Trillion in USA. I think their housing prices drop by an average of 20% already. 5% boost can stem systemic risk for not very long I suspect, but gives the rich shareholders a chance to escape with their pants on leaving the middle Americans to foot the bill for many years to come. . Things will get worst and worst as this crises unravels and other risk eg credit cards, car loans etc come to light. So the Ben & Paul would subscribe to more alcohol to sober up a drinking binged hangover. How typical. Credit Traders Sowing Seeds of Destruction Prompt SEC Crackdown By Shannon D. Harrington, Caroline Salas and Pierre Paulden Sept. 24 (Bloomberg) -- The $62 trillion market for credit- default swaps, created to protect banks from loan losses, helped fuel a near-meltdown in the financial system and now may be regulated for the first time. The derivatives precipitated plunges in the shares and debt of Wall Street firms, accelerating the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and the U.S. takeover of American International Group Inc., the biggest U.S. insurer. Now, regulators want to bring oversight to a part of the credit market that may be more susceptible to manipulation than selling stocks short, according to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox. Banks ``are suffering the consequences of their own actions,'' said Thomas Priore, chief executive officer of Institutional Credit Partners, LLC, a New York-based hedge fund with $13 billion in assets. ``They created a mechanism through default swaps to reflect a view on credit that has taken on a life of its own.'' The swaps became one-way bets on the demise of financial institutions as traders hedged the risk that their partners might implode, said Gary Kelly, a strategist at broker Tradition Asiel Securities Inc. in New York. The wagers sent distorted signals about credit risk, he said. The resulting run on shares of financial companies prompted Cox yesterday to seek enforcement powers over the market. New York State will also start regulating some sales of the derivatives, according to Governor David Paterson. Loan Protection ``The absence of regulatory oversight is the principal cause of the Wall Street meltdown we are currently witnessing,'' Paterson said in a statement Sept. 22. Banks started buying and selling credit derivatives in the mid-1990s to protect loan portfolios, Andy Brindle, the former head of JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s credit-derivatives group, said in 2003. The International Swaps and Derivatives Association started reporting credit-derivative volumes in 2001, when volume stood at $919 billion. The contracts trade in over-the-counter deals, leaving each side exposed to the risk their partner will default. There's no exchange or clearinghouse for the swaps and no system for publicly reporting trades. Credit-default swaps aren't issued or repaid by the companies referred to in contracts. The instruments pay the holder the face value of the amount protected in exchange for the underlying securities if a borrower fails to adhere to debt agreements. Death Spiral The market helped set off a death spiral this month for Lehman and AIG as a jump in the cost of protecting debt, or credit spreads, pushed down their shares. That eroded capital and prompted credit-rating companies to threaten downgrades. Bear Stearns Cos. met a similar fate in March before JPMorgan took the bank over in a rescue orchestrated by the Federal Reserve and Treasury. Credit spreads were exaggerated as banks and investors hedging the risk of their trading partners defaulting rushed to buy swaps. That sent the price of protection soaring. ``The risk concerns became massively overblown,'' said Tradition's Kelly, who for the past three years made recommendations on stocks based on signals from credit-default swaps. ``Now, the time that the equity market starts heavily focusing on the CDS market, it's probably a period where its reliability is the most questionable.'' The difference between the cost at which dealers sell and buy protection on Merrill Lynch & Co., AIG, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Wachovia Corp. widened last week to an average of about 63 basis points, compared with 10 basis points the previous week, according to quotes from London-based CMA Datavision. A basis point is equivalent to 0.01 percentage point. `Nonsense' Trades Trading in the derivatives became ``nonsense,'' Morgan Stanley Chief Financial Officer Colm Kelleher, 51, told investors after reporting third-quarter earnings Sept. 16. The New York-based securities firm had net income of $1.43 billion in the quarter and reported $175 billion of cash and available equivalents, up from an average of $135 billion the prior quarter. Credit swaps showed a higher risk of default for the broker than homebuilder Lennar Corp., which reported losses in each of the last six quarters. Credit-default sellers on Sept. 17 demanded as much as $2.1 million upfront and $513,000 a year to protect $10 million in Morgan Stanley bonds from default for five years. The price implied a 65 percent chance the company would go bust within five years, based on a valuation model created by JPMorgan. The cost has since dropped to $500,000 a year, implying it has a more than one-in-three chance of failing. `No Rational Basis' The price moves had ``no rational basis,'' and helped touch off a 66 percent slump in his firm's stock last week, said CEO John Mack, 63. ``Why should CDS spreads be having such a big impact on the stocks?'' Glenn Schorr, a UBS AG analyst in New York, wrote in a Sept. 17 report. ``Isn't this a bit disconcerting that the illiquid CDS market, or the rating agencies, can have so much influence on the fate of these companies and alter the landscape of the brokerage industry?'' Merrill Lynch, seeking to prevent itself from being the market's next target, agreed to be bought by Bank of America Corp. last week after credit-default swaps implied a one-in-three chance of default in five years and the shares plunged 31 percent in four days. Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, the last of the five big U.S. investment banks, sought approval to become bank holding companies, allowing them to build deposit bases and move away from a business model that investors had deemed too dependent on borrowed money, or leverage. `Default Risks' Credit swap traders shouldn't be blamed for pushing Lehman into its grave, according to Tim Backshall, chief strategist at Credit Derivatives Research LLC in Walnut Creek, California. ``A company that relies on short-term funding and high leverage is destined to face higher default risks,'' he said. Lehman spokesman Mark Lane in New York didn't return calls for comment. Credit-swap buyers and sellers don't need to own bonds or other debt of the company referred to in a contract. This leads to ``outsized incentives'' for investors to bet on an issuer defaulting, Cox said in Congressional testimony yesterday. ``We are looking at the effects of short-selling'' of shares, he said. ``Greater opportunities for manipulation exist in the CDS market.'' `Ill-Fitting' Regulation Short sellers borrow shares and attempt to profit by repurchasing the securities later at a lower price and returning them to the holder. ``Proposals which would seek to treat privately negotiated contracts as securities, or otherwise apply ill-fitting regulatory regimes to these agreements, are likely to deter healthy economic activity,'' Robert Pickel, ISDA's CEO, said in a statement yesterday. Banks face pressure from regulators to create a clearinghouse by the end of the year that would back trades between dealers and absorb the failure of a market-maker. New York State also plans to treat some credit-default swaps as insurance policies after AIG sold protection on more than $400 billion of debt that led to $18 billion of losses in three quarters. Collateral Demand The surge in AIG's credit spreads and slump in the shares prompted Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's to cut the insurer's ratings on Sept. 15. That allowed counterparties to demand more than $13 billion in collateral on swap trades and forced the company to cede control to the government in exchange for an $85 billion loan. ``A major part of AIG's problems were created when credit- default swaps were issued by a non-insurance unit that did not hold sufficient reserves,'' the statement from Paterson's office said. Goldman Sachs, which reported $4.9 billion of writedowns and credit losses the past year, saw credit-default swaps widen to a record 685 basis points on Sept. 17 from 148 at the end of August, suggesting a 45 percent chance of default in five years. Goldman shares fell to as low as $85.88 on Sept. 18 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, and closed yesterday at $125.05, down 42 percent this year. Spokesman Michael Duvally declined to comment. Taking Cues Stock investors began taking cues from the derivatives in 2005, when the contracts moved before leveraged buyouts and other transactions were announced, said Tradition's Kelly. When a surge in Bear Stearns's credit swaps preceded its collapse, investors began looking to the market for early signs of stress in other financial companies. ``It's become suddenly a huge focus of the market,'' Tradition's Kelly said. ``Credit issues have really begun to start driving the equity market.'' Frank Glaser, 75, a retired Hughes Aircraft executive in Los Angeles dumped Wachovia preferred shares he bought in December after asking his broker at UBS where credit-default swaps on the Charlotte, North Carolina, based-company were trading. The derivatives implied a 47 percent chance of default in five years on Sept. 17, the day Glaser sold the shares at a loss, based on the JPMorgan valuation model. Wachovia is managing through the pressure in the credit markets and is financially sound, spokeswoman Christy Phillips- Brown said. The shares fell to as low as $8.50 last week and closed at $14.75 yesterday. ``We don't trust the rating agencies,'' Glaser said last week. ``Lehman was A2 the day before it went bust, so what have I got to go on? I listen to the president of Wachovia. He sounded like he really knew what he was doing, and I'm reasonably sure he's going to come out of it. But the market doesn't believe him because the credit-default swaps are huge

Beri sad to see on today newpaper, ex 972 DJ Bily Wang has relapsed into cancer again and fear is he may not recover, so preparing for his final days now.

LIGHTNING killed and injured a dozen people in Russia in the past two weeks . Some officials are blaming widespread use of electronic gadgets like handphones for the increase in deaths, reported CNN. On Wednesday, a lightning bolt killed three sunbathers in the town of Neftekamsk, about 1,290km east of Moscow. One victim, Marina Sadykova, 26, was among a few people on a beach along the Kama River when a storm moved in. Witnesses said they saw a sharp, blinding ray of light that raised seven metres of sand. The woman, the mother of a 5-month-old boy, was talking on a handphone when she was killed. According to police, the phone was found melted in her hand. In other parts of Russia, other instances of lightning-related deaths include the case of a 10-year-old boy riding a bike while talking on a handphone and an elderly farmer tending her potato plants. Mr Leonid Tarkov of the weather observation centre Fobos said he believes that the increase in lightning strikes may be linked to the prevalence of portable electronic devices, such as handphones or music players. 'These things are electromagnetic field carriers,' he said. 'That makes them, in essence, conductors. Thunderbolts are frequently attracted to such things, and hits are often connected with a lethal outcome.' The theory that lightning can follow the weak electromagnetic fields of such devices is rejected by virtually all scientists. But there is evidence that a lightning strike is more likely to be fatal for a person carrying any object with metal in it. Mr Tarkov himself pointed out another explanation for the surge in lightning strikes in Russia recently: The country has been hit by an unusually high number of storms. He said Moscow is 139 per cent above normal for rainfall this month, including 51mm of rain from a fierce thunderstorm on Wednesday, which is equal to five buckets of water on each square metre

Anyone any idea where can I go to send in xbox360 repair? any address or contact number and hw i shld go abt it.. Thanks. My set not modded, original, 1yr plus old.. Heard free warranty extended by microsoft to 3yrs.. true?

July 4, 2008 Army regular run over by lorry - it's an accident By Elena Chong AN ARMY physical training instructor died about an hour after he was run over by a lorry when he fell off his scooter and landed on an expressway. Mr Lim Chee Wee, 23, was riding behind his friend, Mr Edward Phua Wen Fu, then 22, on a motorcycle along Pan-Island Expressway last Oct 26 morning when Mr Phua decided to take shelter from the heavy downpour at the Toh Guan flyover. Mr Lim did not realise that his friend had collided into the back of his machine. Due to the impact, Mr Lim fell to the right and landed on the left lane of PIE while his friend fell along the road shoulder. Just then, a lorry driven by Mr Tan Poh Soon, 35, ran over Mr Lim as he could not stop in time. At Friday's coroner's inquiry into Mr Lim's death, Mr Tan, who was named a potential defendant, chose to remain silent. In recording a verdict of misadventure, State Coroner Earnest Lau said on the evidence, he did not think any objective motorist in the potential defendant's position would be able to take evasive action in a split second. He said neither Mr Tan nor Mr Phua was culpable. http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/...ory_254507.html surprisingly nobody question if the lorry was too close for comfort. and that he cud overrun 1 motorbike yet not the other... afterall, lorry do tat 40% longer distance to stop. so wat is sensible precaution esp when raining. if he has maintained safe distance + 40% wud this hv happened?

June 21, 2008 Burglar leaps 5 storeys to his death on being spotted By Lim Heng Liang A BURGLAR jumped five storeys to his death yesterday after being surprised by the owner of a flat who caught him in her living room. The man was trying to make a quick escape from the three-room flat in Marsiling Lane, but instead landed 15m below with a thud. 'Only a stupid person will enter my house. There's nothing to steal,' said Madam Irene Tan. The 50-year-old chanced upon the burglar, who was described as a man covered in tattoos, at around 10am after returning from her morning stroll. Madam Tan said he panicked, ran to her master bedroom and then took a shortcut to the first floor - from five floors up. A neighbour from two floors below, Mr Abdul Rahman, said he heard the commotion. 'I heard a woman screaming: 'Stop, don't jump'. After that, I heard something drop, boom!' That is when he peered out of his window. 'I saw two guys carry a man and put him inside a car before driving off.' Only a patch of blood was left at the scene. The police confirmed last night that the man, who was in his 40s, died at about 11.45am after being taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital. Madam Tan said she had left a back window open and thinks the man scaled her block like 'Spiderman' to break in. Mr Abdul Rahman, 49, suspects the men may be linked to the recent cases of theft. The driver of the vehicle which took away the injured man is currently assisting the police in the investigations. SURPRISED BY OWNER: Madam Irene Tan returned home to her flat to see a man in her living room. The burglar panicked, rushed into the master bedroom and jumped from a window of the fifth-floor flat in Marsiling Lane. He later died in hospital. -- ST PHOTO: DESMOND LIM http://www.straitstimes.com/Free/Story/STIStory_250126.html

I was travelling on the 2nd lane along bukit batok road on my way home from work. Tired & hungry & suddenly, this bloody Maroon Wish driver cut right in front me from 1st lane to 2nd lane in between me & the car in front. I wasn't even hogging him & the space between me & the car in front was about 1.5 car length. That woke me up with a jolt & wondering what this f**ker was trying to pull. So, I switched to 1st lane & took a glance at him while driving past. Suddenly he sped up again & cut right in front & played e-brake with me. All the while, he was swerving in/out of his lane as if trying to prevent me from overtaking. Maybe he was trying to show off his driving skills or telling me his Wish very solid. So, I tried to wave him to pull to the side & talk about it & guess what, that gutless sorry excuse for a man sped away even faster. Sigh...got balls to play e-brake but no balls to come out & talk man to man. Guess he ran home to mama for milk. Don't think he is going to be so lucky the next time.

Had a quick glance at today ST and was sadden by the news that one youth age 18 was killed in a vehicle accident when the vehicle broke into two pieces and the vehicle made is beyong reconition. The youth who died was thrown out of the vehicle and so to for the rear passenger who broke both her legs. The driver this time was also another youth age 19 years. Another vehicle driven by a lady had knocked onto the first vehicle and her vehicle too, mount a kerb and hit onto a tree. There is an eye witness who gave the full account of the accident. (as I unable to login to the ST web-site due to office policy, any member here could login to ST e-papers to post the story on the accident, thks) At 19 yrs, the most is a new licence holder and speeding in early Sunday morning...... . He will leave by his guilt for the rest of his life.

Poly student gets maximum fine for negligent driving He was also banned from driving for five years for causing passenger's death. By Elena Chong, Court Correspondent A MOTORIST was taking his passengers home late one evening when it skidded, went up a centre road divider and overturned on the opposite side of the road. A rear right passenger died about two months after the June 15, 2006 accident. On Monday, second-year polytechnic student Shawn Goh Jin Fa, 24, was given the maximum fine of $10,000 and banned from driving for five years for causing the death of Mr Taqdir Buang, 23, through his negligence. One of the two other passengers was treated as an outpatient while the other was given two weeks' medical leave. A district court heard that Goh was driving on the extreme right lane of Clementi Road at about 11.30pm when he drove negligently and lost control of the car while overtaking a car from the left side of that car. His car went up the road divider, hit a metal railing and overturned on the centre lane of the three-lane road on the opposite side. Mr Taqdir suffered serious head injuries and died 64 days later in hospital on Aug 18. Goh could have been jailed for up to two years or fined or jailed and fined for the offence. http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/...ory_187728.html clementi... singapore or ngee ann?

source: http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/news/story/0,...,145791,00.html? THE high-tech anti-theft devices in his Mercedes-Benz were supposed to foil car thieves. Click to see larger image Mr Low Tek Chai, who was married, had three children. But that wasn't enough to save the life of a a Malaysian limousine driver yesterday. Mr Low Tek Chai, 46, was bashed to death in Kuala Lumpur by three men who became furious after their attempt to steal the vehicle was thwarted by the 'smart' car. At 5.40am yesterday, Mr Low drove his limousine to a Jalan Gombak petrol station to pump petrol, reported the New Straits Times. A Proton Perdana then stopped at the pump beside his. Sentul deputy OCPD Supt Zainuddin Ahmad told reporters: 'Three men in their late 20s got out of the Proton. 'Suddenly, one of them attacked the victim repeatedly, causing him to bleed and fall to the ground.' 'The attacker then drove off with the victim's dark blue Mercedes while the other two suspects fled in the Proton Perdana.' STUCK After about 50m, the limousine stopped, thanks to its anti-theft device, reported China Press. The doors locked and the man inside had to smash a window screen to get out. Click to see larger image The limousine he drove that day. -- Pictures: CHINA PRESS The men were unable to re-start the car because a special microchip and the car owner's fingerprint were needed to do so. DRAGGED HIM BACK They then went back to the petrol station and dragged the near-unconscious Mr Low - whom they had left lying in a pool of blood on the ground - back to the Merc. They tried to make him deactivate the anti-theft device, but they were unsuccessful. Enraged, they started hitting Mr Low again and carried on until he was dead, reported China Press. They then pushed his body into the back seat and left. Witnesses said that the entire incident took about three minutes and that no one had helped Mr Low because the robbers were armed. Click to see larger image The blood-stained scene at the Kuala Lumpur petrol pump where Mr Low was set upon and beaten. Mr Low, who was married with three childern - two sons and a daughter - worked for a private firm driving people to and from KL International Airport. His wife, with relatives by her side, was at the mortuary yesterday morning to identify his body. She told China Press that her husband had left the house for work at about 5am and that she got a phone call about his death not long after. Supt Zainuddin said that the police had closed-circuit TV recordings of the incident, but the footage was not clear. He also said that the police had classified the case as murder and were investigating whether the motive was revenge.

http://www.straitstimes.com/Latest%2BNews/...ory_168481.html ESCAPED WITH JUST A FINE????

The 38-year-old driver of this trailer truck was crushed to death by the steel rods he was transporting at about 2pm today (14 Sept) in Jurong. STOMPer Yeow, 43, sent this photo in an MMS at about 2.30pm, saying a driver had been killed. "I saw the rescuers trying to take the body out. I think the steel rods spilled towards him because he applied emergency brake suddenly," Mr Yeow told STOMP. STOMP contacted the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) which said it received a call at 2.19pm about an accident at the junction of Pioneer Road North and Lokyang Way. "A trailer was carrying metal rods. The driver was pinned under the steel rods in his seat. "He was trapped in the seat and SCDF rescuers extricated him from the seat. He was pronounced dead on the spot," a spokesman told STOMP. http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/viewPost5435.aspx

DURING the morning peak hours of April 23, salesman Chan Chi Heng was speeding at 160kmh moments before his car smashed into a truck. He died and yesterday the Coroner's Court ruled it an accident or a misadventure. According to a witness who was driving to the city with her father, two cars raced past her as she was travelling along Changi Coast Road in the direction of Nicoll Drive at about 9.30am on April 24 this year. She told the court that they were racing 'recklessly and carelessly'. She then saw Mr Chan trying to overtake the other car on the left before swerving right to escape hitting a slower-moving vehicle in front. He slammed head on into an oncoming DHL Global Mail truck. The other racer sped off. Civil Defence officers had to cut the wreck to free the truck driver and to get to Mr Chan's body. The other driver has recovered from arm and leg injuries.

Driving on the wrong side of the road, drunk Driver could not explain his actions, which left one dead Leong Wee Keat [email protected] HE DOES not remember afterwards how he ended up driving against the flow of traffic along an expressway ? and worse, without his headlights turned on. . Eric Lim Liang Heng (picture) was drunk ?with twice the legally allowed level of alcohol in his bloodstream ?when his van crashed head-on into a car at about 4am on Feb 12 last year, killing its driver, Mr Toh Bock Keong, 34. . On Friday, Lim was jailed for three and a half years and disqualified from driving for 20 years, after he pleaded guilty to dangerous and drink driving. . Delivering the verdict, District Judge Aedit Abdullah said the offences were "grave and serious" and that a deterrent sentence was needed. . In court, it remained a mystery as to why Lim was driving his van against the flow of traffic on the Tampines Expressway. In his mitigation plea, the 28-year-old claimed he could not recall what had happened and that the accident had "caused him to suffer memory loss". . A driver who witnessed the accident said he had "noticed a dark object" approaching from the opposite direction, towards the Seletar Expressway. . Seconds later, the witness looked in his rear mirror and saw that Lim's van had collided into Mr Toh's car. . The crash wrecked Mr Toh's black Renault ?the front windscreen was shattered and dislodged, the right side of the car was extensively damaged down its length, and the top panel crumpled. . Pleading for leniency on Friday, Lim's lawyer Ravinderpal Singh said his client regretted his mistake and would "carry the guilt about what happened with him for the rest of his life". . Mr Ravinderpal also told the court that Lim had suffered permanent injuries from the accident. A medical report described Lim as "unable to run, walk for long distances and squat". He also cannot carry things with his left hand. . On Friday, the case of another suspected drink driver was adjourned until June 18. Last month, Wong Heng Chiang's car had hurtled across Penang Road and crashed into a bus stop, injuring six people. . Wong, 27, faces eight charges in all, including that of drink driving, dangerous driving and causing grievous hurt through a negligent act. He is out on $10,000 bail. ----------------- DUI - driving under influence http://www.todayonline.com/articles/193376.asp so what if he can't spank his monkey with his left hand.. he can still do it with his right... stoopig.

when its time for u to go means it time for you to go i guess... what am i babbling about? juz watch the gif http://www.supload.us/free/ATT962254.gif/view/

Everybody knows of the accident involving Taiwan actress Xu Wei Lun recently. Just received photographs her accident vehicle which is a Mini. Also attach is a newspaper report of how the accident had happened. Very sad story.

U.S. study finds the risk of death higher for male drivers By Seth Borenstein - 19 Jan, 2007 AP That age-old stereotype about dangerous women drivers is shattered in a big new traffic analysis in the U.S.: Male drivers have a 77 percent higher risk of dying in a car accident than women, based on miles driven. And the author of the research says he takes it to heart when he travels -- his wife takes the wheel. "I put a mitt in my mouth and ride shotgun," said David Gerard, a Carnegie Mellon University researcher who co-authored a major new U.S. road risk analysis. The study holds plenty of surprises. --The highway death rate is higher for cautious 82-year-old women than for risk-taking 16-year-old boys. --The northeastern region known as New England is the safest area for drivers -- despite all those stories about crazy Boston drivers. --The safest passenger is a youngster strapped in a car seat and being driven during morning rush hour. The findings are from Traffic STATS, a detailed and searchable new risk analysis of road fatality statistics by Carnegie Mellon for the American Automobile Association. Plans are to make the report public next week, but The Associated Press got an early look. The analysis calculates that overall, about one death occurs for every 100 million passenger miles (160 million passenger kilometers) traveled. And it shows that some long-held assumptions about safety on U.S. highways do not jibe with hard numbers. It lists the risk of road death by age, gender, type of vehicle, time of day and geographic region. "We are finding comparisons that are surprising all the time," said study co-author Paul Fischbeck, a Carnegie Mellon professor of social and decision sciences. "What is necessary now is to go through and do that second level of analysis to figure out why some of these things are true." For example, those dangerous 82-year-old women are 60 percent more likely to die on the road than a 16-year-old boy because they are so frail, said Anne McCartt, a research official at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, who was not part of the study. "It's an issue not of risk-taking behavior, but of fragility," McCartt said. The elderly are more likely to die when they are injured in an accident, she said, an explanation that Gerard and Fischbeck validate. These elderly women have the nation's highest road death risks even when they're not driving -- five times higher than the national average. Right behind octogenarians in high risk are young male drivers, ages 16-23 with fatality rates four times higher than average. That can be attributed to "inexperience and immaturity," McCartt said. As for men being more likely to die than women? McCartt and Fischbeck said men take more risks, speed more, drink and drive more. "They do stupider things," said Fischbeck, a former military pilot who has twin toddlers and a "totally unsafe" 1974 Volkswagen Thing.

2 persons died in their grey suzuki swift at mscp cck on saturday 27 November. One possibly is carbon monoxide poisoning...windows wound up, aircon on, battery flat, ignition on. High levels of carbon monoxide can cause loss of consiousness and death.

accident juz occured here at my house. A red Hyundai Accent skidded along Sin Ming Ave in the direction towards Upper Thomson Road. the car propbably over-steered as it crossed over the road of the opposite traffik and skidded to a halt on a patch of grass even though there is a kerb in the middle to separate the lanes. no visible damage could be seen as i was on the opposite side of the road.

it all started last saturday when me and my uncle was out for prata at jalan kayu. car was fine until on the way back, suddenly the aircon wasnt cold at all, and thinking it was the refrigerant, drove on as usual and reached home shortly after. the next day, father drove to work with the car and on the way back, the radiator gave way(it happened before, once), father went to nearby petrol station and top up immediately, got scalded abit. managed to drive home and call for tow truck. the estimated cost of repairing is about 1k (overhaul? not sure), now he decided to scrap the car as its about 9 years old, COE was high then rather sad now as im beginning to like that car , rev high high, change gear, etc. was hoping to hone my driving skills more with it. what new car is his mind? stay tuned to find out