Plunging ice injures car passenger
A teenager suffered a cut above his eye in a freak traffic incident yesterday (Mon).The 15-year-old was sitting in the passenger seat of a car being driven by his father near Bergheim in the province of Salzburg when a three-centimetre thick sheet of solid ice smashed through the windscreen window.The object, which was a square metre in size, had dropped off the snow-covered roof of a truck driving ahead of the vehicle in which the teen was sitting.The boy sustained a cut on his forehead a few centimetres above his right eye. He was hospitalised in a clinic in Salzburg.The identity of the lorry driver was not revealed by officials who managed to track the man down shortly after the incident. He had allegedly been unaware of what happened. The man was not fined but reprimanded for failing to clear his vehicle from ice and snow properly.The Austrian Traffic Club (VCÖ) suggested earlier this month that drivers should voluntarily halve their speed in the current wintry conditions considering the significantly longer distance required to brake.Vast parts of Austria experienced dozens of centimetres of snow in the past few weeks. The strong snowfall and low temperatures created treacherous traffic conditions in countrys mountainous areas as well as in its lowlands.Motorists whose cars are not equipped with winter tyres face fines between 35 and 5,000 Euros.