7 Year Old Kid drives to school

[dj_venom]

I saw this hillarious article in the news today, thought you might like it:

Boy, 7, helps mum by driving to school
By Glenis Green
28oct05

SEVEN-year-old Travis Clark thought he would try to help out his struggling mother - by taking her car and driving himself to school.

Young Travis had to adjust the driver's seat and balance on the edge of it so he could reach the pedals of the automatic Holden Commodore.

But he still managed to reverse it out of the family carport, execute a three-point turn, drive through a roundabout and negotiate three corners in the 1.5km to his Hervey Bay school before spinning out of control.

Stunned mother Elaine Clark said the incident would have been funny if it had not been so dangerous.

"It's just unbelievable and I'm so grateful there wasn't a more serious outcome," she said. "He could have killed someone or himself."

Ms Clark said she believed that Travis might have just been trying to help her out and might also have been influenced by watching a television show depicting children stealing cars the night before.

"I've been sick and in hospital and he's been a good boy looking after me," she said.

Ms Clark said she heard Travis get up at 5.30am and move around the house, getting ready for school, after telling her the night before he planned to walk, to save her the trouble of driving him.

With no real idea how early it was - and because it was raining - he apparently decided at the last minute to drive.

"I must have dozed off . . . and I didn't know until the school rang at 5.50am and told me what had happened," Ms Clark said.

Worried about being seen, Travis had tried to drive around the back of the school to park - instead spinning out and hitting a kerb, which buckled the car's front wheel and chassis. He was not hurt.

"He went a bit too far . . . he couldn't work out the brake," Ms Clark said. "The car's all bent underneath and it could cost me up to $4000 to fix and I don't know what's going to happen with the insurance - I'm just a sole parent and I haven't got enough money."

Ms Clark said the accident meant Travis would not be getting a Christmas present this year and he had also been banned from watching television.

So, comments about it, I just think it's amazing the kid did it, and that he drove so well.

[Luis Antonio]

In Brazil we have some things like that. In fact I've witnessed one. A boy from the school I worked to lived 2 blocks from the school, and he was very rich. He had one of those electrical cars. His mom came on foot, and he came on one of those cars. Of course we told her it was, to say the least, a way to incentivate him to break the law. She was offended, to our surprise.

[Hill-Shatar]

I had a slightly similar experience... not bad, but when I was 6 I tried to drive my grandfathers tractor. Thankfully at the time I did not know how to use it, and I had left the tractors main gear in neutral. After trying several times to move the second gears (the 1-6 and reverse after setting the tractor into high or low gears), I retried the first and found out how to change it to low, in which the tractor began to drift forwards.

I could not reach the clutch to show down, so shoved it into neutral with the gear shift. no a good thing to do when a the tonnage of a tractor is slipping forwards.

Oh, well, I repaid the costs when I was 14. The clutch was not THAT badly damaged, and I think I moved a total of ten meters.

[Phreddie]

the kid sounds like a better driver than i am, its amazing that he knew how to do all that stuff, hes only seven!

[dj_venom]

His mum reckons that he is very observant, though when they interviewed the kid, he was extremely shy, and his mum didn't look like the sharpest tool in the shed.

But hey, cheers to a grossly illegal act not getting punished /

[Phreddie]

*raises glass*

To the lil bugger who could!.... almost...

[Obi-Wan-Evan]

No christmas present and no tv.. ouch..

[Antharias2k]

You have to give the kid credit for being innocent and thinking about helping his mother because she was ill. He should be given credit and should actually be rewarded. Not punished, but I see his mother's point. How many other 7 year olds would do that?

[dj_venom]

I think that's just an excuse, he didn't mention the drag races and that mysterious car in the garage that he won.

But good on the wee bloke.