8 Die in Crash on Taconic State Parkway

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bogeygal said:
So they have ruled out a medical reason for the crash.

I'm just wondering, because I sometimes have to drive over the Tappan Zee Bridge when I visit my son at law school, if she may have had a "panic attack" (you do feel disoriented and panicked). That would not be found out at an autopsy.

IDK, but I'm petrified of that bridge, and then she had to get on the Taconic Pkwy. We'll have to see if drugs/alcohol were in her system, but she knew she had the responsibility of driving all those children, so I can't imagine that unless we learn more from the results.

All so sad.
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You can indeed be very disoriented when having a panic attack - at least that is what people who have had them have told me.
 
southcitymom said:
You can indeed be very disoriented when having a panic attack - at least that is what people who have had them have told me.
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I have a history of panic attacks and from experience know that you can become disoriented. You become so panicked and usually that panic fixates on one thing that you can't stop thinking about. Personally mine manifest as my heart starting to beat very hard and fast which causes me to become convinced I am having a heart-attack and I am going to keel over at any minute and that causes my heart to beat faster, breathing to become shallow - it is perpetuating cycle that can be very hard to get out of especially if you don't have someone with you to give you support and comfort. All of your senses become heightened - sounds are louder, things seem to moving quicker, you sense of smell and touch is more acute.

I can't imagine going into that state of mind while driving and having children who I felt responsible for and who could be talking, laughing which during the attack would sound like they were talking about 100,000 times louder than they actually were and their innocent chitter-chatter could easily in her mind turn into sounding ominous like they were all screaming at her telling her to do this or that.
 
You guys all make really good points. I dealt with panic attacks for awhile after my mom died about 10 years ago and they are truly debilitating. I suppose that is a definite possibility.

Other than the panic attack possibility I have difficulty accepting that it could be any other sort of physical/mental impairment because of the number of witnesses who claim she was driving in that lane straight and "normal" as could be.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/...ong-way-van-driver&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL

And bogeygal I hate the Tappan Zee too.
 
but surely the brother (last person she talked to, correct?) has SOME clue as to what happened...? didn't she give, or didn't he ask for,, any further details.. beyond simply 'not feeling well'....?
 
According to articles, witnesses said she was staying in the lines and not swerving despite other cars' attempts to honk and flash lights to warn her she was going the wrong way.
If she didn't feel well enough to drive she should have pulled over. 3 of those kids in the car were her nieces, not to mention her own son and daughter.
I, too found it fishy she called her brother or BIL instead of her husband, maybe she got in a fight with the husband?
Very very shady and now 8 lives are lost due to her bad judgement.
 
I have to say that it doesn't strike me as odd that she called her brother and not her husband. If I had my kids and one of my sibling's kids and I was feeling funky, I definitely would call my sibling.

Anyway - we don't know if she tried her husband first or knew her husband was somehow indisposed or went to hit the speed dial for her husband on her cell phone and accidentally hit the one for her brother or what.

No facts tell us why she called her brother, but I think it's a leap to say a sister with a brother's children calling the brother "suspicious." I'd call it reasonable.
 
SleuthyMama said:
Well, this doesn't make me feel any better.

"No medical reason" for Taconic State Crash-Mom was healthy

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local...way_crash_autopsy_shows_mom_diane_schule.html
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Hmm. A couple of things: this article indicated to me that the brother called troopers right after his sister called him, and not after the accident. Then they were searching for her van over 40 miles of freeway.... He must have been pretty worried about whatever she had to say. That's how I read it, anyway.

Also, does anyone make anything out of the fact that she was in the far left lane on the wrong side of the road? Something makes me feel like you would stay in the right lane in cases of sensing there might be something wrong--either with you or with the situation.
 
something seems shady? huh? what and why?

and who thought of suicide? Had she been having emotional problems? or where are you getting these ideas from?

Maybe she was running froom the mafia?

Give this lady a break..she too is a victim...no doubt we will ever know just what happened.

God bless these families.
 
Good morning all. Here are some updates to some of your questions.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/article/20090730/NEWS01/90730001

http://www.nypost.com/seven/07302009/news/regionalnews/unspeakable_pain_182075.htm

From the latest reports, Diane apparently called her brother because her husband, who had also been on the camping trip to Sullivan County with them, was headed directly to a fishing trip in another part of Sullivan County and was out of cellphone range. Hence why she called her brother instead.

She apparently told her brother she felt disoriented and couldn't see very well. Which really makes me anguish over why she chose to continue driving rather than wait for her brother to come get them.

Tapu, in reference to your comment about them searching 40 miles of highway for her...that turned out to be fruitless because by that point she had gotten OFF NYS Thruway and was headed toward the Taconic and the accident.

Now the thing that mystifies me is why her cell phone was found on the jersey barrier at the Thruway rest stop where they pulled over to call her bro. Could be in her "disoriented" state that she put the phone down, got in the minivan and took off, not realizing she'd left the phone behind.

Tapu, the way I read the fact that she was in the left lane on the Taconic is she thought, mistakenly, of course, that she was going in the CORRECT direction so really, to her it would have been HER right lane. But it was really the faster moving LEFT lane. Is that making sense?
 
SleuthyMama said:
Another link. This one from the NY Daily News. More of the same but I do notice a distinct turn in the tone of the comments at the end of this article.

The discarded cell phone is perplexing.

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local...ne_say_she_dumped_cell_moments_before_ta.html
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Wow, I don't know what to think about the discarded cell phone and that they may check her blood sugar levels...they don't think she commited suicide, but they mention she may have "blacked out".

I felt so bad seeing the grief of the family in that photo. It's beyond words.
 
Y'all, it still seems to me that this could have been a physical event. I can't imagine an autopsy could definitively conclude that she had not blacked out for some reason (especially if the physical blackout had been caused by a psychological event).
 
Very valid point, SCM. How would an autopsy show if someone blacked out?

But, if she did black out then it happened at just the exact moment that she didn's swerve at all and instead just hit that other car head on.

I remain completely mystified.
 
SleuthyMama said:
Very valid point, SCM. How would an autopsy show if someone blacked out?

But, if she did black out then it happened at just the exact moment that she didn's swerve at all and instead just hit that other car head on.

I remain completely mystified.
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Actually, SM, people can often function in a blackout in such a way that seems very normal - at least, that happens a good deal in drug or alcohol induced blackouts (ie - people get in the car and drive home or boogie down on a dance floor or whatever, but the next morning, they have no recollection whatsoever). I believe the same could be said of a non-chemically induced blackout.

Unless I am missing something, I do not think a physical cause can be ruled out with any real certainty.

I remain with you - mystified. Something was going on with that woman and it sounds like it came and went - bad enough to call her brother, but then she felt good enough to keep driving and driving well for two hours. I've seen nothing that can make me honestly believe this was a multiple murder/suicide - I don't buy that for a second without a lot more info.
 
southcitymom said:
I have to say that it doesn't strike me as odd that she called her brother and not her husband. If I had my kids and one of my sibling's kids and I was feeling funky, I definitely would call my sibling.

Anyway - we don't know if she tried her husband first or knew her husband was somehow indisposed or went to hit the speed dial for her husband on her cell phone and accidentally hit the one for her brother or what.

No facts tell us why she called her brother, but I think it's a leap to say a sister with a brother's children calling the brother "suspicious." I'd call it reasonable.
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From what i've read the husband went fishing elsewhere and was out of cell phone range supposedly while she was driving home. I'm not sure if this has been proven or not.. the husband is a cop in Long Island somewhere i think..
 
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