A 21-year-old man from Zuidlaren is not to blame for the fatal accident in Gieten, which took place at the end of July 2022. The then 19-year-old man was driving a tractor with a tipper on the Bonnerdijk, but overlooked a motorcyclist when he wanted to turn. A collision followed, which the driver of the motorcycle did not survive.
The young tractor driver was on his way to Gieten to help his father in the fields when he wanted to turn onto the Veentangerdijk. A car drove behind him and the man from Southland also saw a shovel driving in the corner of his eye. He took a good look in the mirrors and then turned the car onto the road.
“Then I suddenly heard a loud whoosh,” the twenty-something told the subdistrict court judge today. He felt his head hit the windshield and didn’t immediately realize what had happened, he said. The tractor driver was then received in shock by the occupants of the car behind him.
“The motorcyclist was driving too fast, the boy couldn’t do anything about it,” the driver later told officers.
The motorcycle that had collided with the agricultural vehicle was completely destroyed. The motorcyclist, a 42-year-old man from Nieuwe Pekela, ended up under the vehicle as a result of the impact. The man in the shovel had seen the motorcyclist brake at the last moment, but closed his eyes so as not to see what was about to happen. According to the shovel driver and two witnesses in a garden nearby, the motorcyclist was driving at too high a speed.
One of the men sneered: “You are allowed to drive 80 kilometers per hour here, not double that.” The police investigation shows that there were no technical defects. The conclusion was that it was an error of judgment on the part of the driver of the tractor. It is likely that the motorcyclist was driving too fast. How much too hard can no longer be determined.
If the motorcyclist had been driving 80 kilometers per hour or less, “he could have stopped in time,” the investigation found.
The Public Prosecution Service (OM) believed that the tractor driver could be blamed for something. “He was not sufficiently attentive while turning,” the Public Prosecution Service stated. This traffic error should result in a fine of six hundred euros, half of which is conditional.
The judge finds that everything shows that the young tractor driver was careful. He moderated his speed and looked around and in the mirrors. “The motorcycle is coming towards you at too high a speed and in dark clothing. There was shadowing from the trees,” she said.
It is very possible that the twenty-something man was therefore unable to see the motorcyclist. “You are not to be blamed.” There was therefore no punishment.