JORDAN Bowes, had the world at his feet at just 19.
Exciting careers beckoned for the Stokesley teenager; he was tipped to reach the top of his beloved retro rallycross racing and drove a car he had made himself.
When the Darlington & Stockton Times ran people’s tributes to him, “talented” was a word used time and time again.
He was studying mechatronics at Teesside University and serving an apprenticeship at global robotics company Labman, who had tipped him to become an “outstanding” engineer.
The people who knew him also spoke of how he could lift a room with his upbeat personality and humour.
An inquest into his death this week in Northallerton heard how he lost control as he took a bend too fast.
Another inquest on the same day heard how a motorcyclist motorcyclist Carl Fowell died after losing control of his bike and crashing into a telegraph pole on the A170.
This month we also had the shocking deaths of two 17-year-old men near Thirsk in a horrific car accident.
When the details of accidents are explained and analysed in inquests, it's striking how sudden and unfair those deaths were for their families; nobody ever thought their loved ones wouldn’t return home that day.
The Department for Transport figures show 1,792 people died in 2016 on Britain’s roads, the highest number since 2011.
Maybe future generations will look back and think it sheer madness that we were prepared to live alongside the great danger that roads and cars presented to life. Let's hope so.
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