Wild wheelchair ride enshrined at Invacare
Steve Fogarty | The Chronicle-Telegram
ELYRIA — Invacare Corp. probably could have locked its best and brightest in a think tank for a week and not come up with a more attention-grabbing testament to its power wheelchairs.
One that seems torn straight out of “Ripley’s Believe It Or Not.”
On Tuesday, the company unveiled a display that tells the incredible story of Ben Carpenter, a Michigan man who went for an impromptu 2-mile ride after the handles of his Invacare power wheelchair got stuck in the front grille of an 18-wheeler going 55 mph.
“We don’t normally test chairs at that speed,” said John Domanick, Invacare’s director of marketing, who got to know the Carpenters when he worked as an Invacare sales rep in Michigan in the 1990s.
Wearing an “I can drive 55” T-shirt made by a friend, Carpenter, 22, and his parents, Don and Joyce, met with reporters and company officials during a brief ceremony Tuesday afternoon in the showroom of the company’s world headquarters off Taylor Street.
Carpenter’s durable yellow-and-black aluminum Invacare rear-wheel-drive power wheelchair became the centerpiece of a display incorporating photos, video and TV coverage by Kalamazoo TV stations and the BBC of the miraculous incident.
Carpenter, who suffers from Duchenne muscular dystrophy, was uninjured in the incident in June 2007 in Paw Paw, Mich., about 10 miles east of Kalamazoo.
Carpenter doesn’t remember much of his brief but harrowing “road trip,” which may be for the best.
It began as he was crossing an intersection in his power wheelchair just as a traffic light turned green. A semi moved forward, as the driver was unable to see Carpenter in front of his cab.
In seconds, the push handles of Carpenter’s wheelchair became caught in the truck’s front grille.
“It was pretty scary,” the soft-spoken Carpenter said. “I was yelling, but then I realized no one could hear me” above the roar of the truck engine.
The truck went about 2 miles before turning into a trucking terminal. A police officer began chasing the truck.
“He thought it was some kind of prank,” said Ben’s father, Don Carpenter, a Pfizer retiree. “I expected the motors and gears to burn out, but they never did. The only thing that was destroyed was the tires.”
Authorities used a crowbar to pry the wheelchair’s handlebars out of the truck grille.
“Had that not happened, the chair could have collapsed, and Ben would have been run over,” said his father. “So many things came together that day.”
Ben Carpenter continued to use the chair — with a new set of tires — until earlier this year when Invacare donated a similar model, costing about $10,000, with upgraded controls allowing him greater options for speed and maneuverability.
Last month, Carpenter’s older sister, Kari, got married.
Diagnosed with muscular dystrophy at age 9, Carpenter has used a wheelchair since he was 14, his mother, a registered nurse who works in a pediatrics intensive care unit at a Kalamazoo children’s hospital, said.
As she speaks about the gradually debilitating effects of her son’s condition, she said she knows the odds are good she will outlive him. But for now, the family is whole, thanks in part to a well-built wheelchair.
“It didn’t faze him too much,” his mother said. “He’s the same old Ben.”
Contact Steve Fogarty at 329-7146 or sfogarty@chroniclet.com.
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Filed by Steve Fogarty | The Chronicle-Telegram August 20th, 2008 in Top Stories. Popularity: 8% |
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Comments
Comment from
Dan S.
August 20, 2008, 2:11 pm
“Invacare Corp. probably could have locked its best and brightest in a think tank for a week and not come up with a more attention-grabbing testament to its power wheelchairs.”
Oh, I’m sure the engineers at Invacare would have had no problems at all, in coming up with a more sure fire way to bring attention to the quality, safety, bullet resistance and endurance of their wheelchairs…
…the tricky part would be in avoiding jail afterwards.
Comment from
Mr. Rush
August 20, 2008, 3:36 pm
Invacare Corp. probably could have locked its best and brightest in a think tank for a week and not come up with a more attention-grabbing testament to its power wheelchairs.
This is an absolute insult to the “best and brightest” at Invacare.
No doubt an interesting story, but all this guy did was get hit by a truck..
duh…
Comment from
johnbear
August 20, 2008, 5:17 pm
The toughest job the Invacare engineers have is getting the instructions interpreted into Chinese for their manufacturing associate overseas.
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