DRIVE TIME

By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Staff Writer

Did you hear the one about the motorcyclist ticketed for going 205 mph in Minnesota? How about the guy in Finland who was fined more than $17,000 for doing 69 mph in a 50-mph zone? Or the police chief who got a speeding ticket in New Zealand from his own officers? Best of all, what about the guy in Britain who was caught by a photo camera doing 2,100 mph — three times the land speed record — in a U-haul truck?

If you think the debate over speeders and speed limits is heating up in Hawai'i, you should hear what they're saying and doing in the rest of the world. Speeding, it seems, is an international phenomenon.

I guess people on both sides of the issue in Hawai'i should be glad we don't have tales like this to report:

• STILLWELL, Minn. — A 20-year-old man was given a ticket last month for driving his 2002 Honda RC51 motorcycle down the highway at 205 mph. If that's true, it means he was covering about 300 feet (about the length of a football field) in one second.

Police say Samuel Tilley was caught by a Minnesota State Patrol officer using a radar gun from a plane, breaking the record for a previous U.S. speeding ticket collected last year by a Pennsylvania man clocked doing 182 mph in his Lamborghini Diablo.

Tilley says the bike isn't capable of going that fast and is fighting the ticket.

• HELSINKI, Finland — A banking executive in Finland was recently fined $17,951 dollars for speeding. He was caught driving 69 mph in the 50-mph zone.

In Finland, traffic fines are given according to one's salary.

• NORTHLAND, New Zealand — Police Superintendent Viv Rickard, the highest-ranking police officer in Northland, has apologized for speeding.

Rickard was caught earlier this year doing 69 mph in a 65-mph zone by one of his own officers who had to chase him down to issue the ticket.

The city had recently started a zero-tolerance approach to speeding in an effort to cut down on traffic-related deaths. The police chief was fined $80.

• HEYSHAM LANCS, England — Dale Richardson was caught driving at 2,100 mph in a 30-mph zone. Or at least that's what his ticket said.

Richardson admits racing home in his Vauxhall truck to give himself an insulin injection when he was clocked by a speed camera (which are pervasive in England) at three times the speed of sound.

Luckily, the local magistrate assumed it was a mechanical mistake of some sort and found him guilty of doing a mere 37 mph and fined him about $50.

The world land speed record, by the way, is 763 mph, Mach 1.02, set in 1997.

• MERCEUIL, France — Eric Clapton won't be driving in France for a while.

Police recently clocked the rock star speeding down a highway at 134 mph in his Porsche 911 Turbo, 53 mph above the speed limit.

After paying a $922 fine and having his license suspended, Clapton rolled away in his Porsche, this time with his secretary driving.

There now, don't you feel a little bit better about what's going on in Hawai'i?

Reach Mike Leidemann at 525-5460 or mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com.