Jackson, 8, has miracle escape after runaway family car took him on a solo ride at Newport
VIDEO: A boy, 8, had a ‘miracle’ escape after he went on a terrifying solo ride in a runaway car on Sydney’s northern beaches — his advice for other youngsters when they are alone in a car is priceless.
Manly
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AN eight-year-old boy had a “miracle” escape from serious injury after he went on a terrifying solo ride in a runaway car.
Jackson Smith, of Newport, was alone in the family’s Ford Falcon station wagon when it careered down a steep driveway and across two lanes of peak hour traffic before ending up in the courtyard of an apartment across the street.
On the way, the car, with Jackson sitting to the front passenger seat, rolled across two footpaths, hurtled down a grass embankment, speared through a large real estate “For Sale” sign and plunged two metres from the top of a cement retaining wall.
The front of the Ford finally came to rest just centimetres from the bedroom of the Seaview Ave apartment in Newport. Its occupants were home at the time.
Jackson emerged from the car with just a small bump on his forehead.
The boy had been in the car, parked at the top of a steep driveway at 4pm last Friday in the block of flats where his family live, searching for his mouthguard before going to footy practice with the Newport Junior Rugby Club.
But curiosity got the better of him.
Even though the keys were not in the ignition, Jackson managed to pull the gear lever down into “Drive”.
“I looked at the gear stick and thought that it looked interesting,” he said this week. “So I put it in Drive and I rolled down the hill and crashed.
“I just landed flat … and whacked my head on the windscreen.
“The people who were there got me out because I was so terrified I couldn’t open the door.”
Jackson’s mother, Lisa Smith, said her son was getting ready for training and was looking for his mouthguard.
“I told him that he might have left it in the car and he said ‘I’ll run down and have a look’.
“That’s not a normal occurrence, I thought ‘wow, that’s showing a bit of independence’.
“The next thing I heard was this big, loud crunch, which must have been Jackson pulling the car into gear.
“I stood up in the loungeroom and saw the whole thing unfold.
“It was terrifying.”
Ms Smith said even though the car’s handbrake was on, she saw it start to roll.
“As it started to move Jackson said he panicked and tried to get the lever back into Park, but of course it wouldn’t go back.
“The car just went really quickly down the driveway, and then across the two lanes of traffic, over the footpaths and down the embankment into the courtyard.”
The car tore off a water tap in the courtyard and just missed a gas pipe and the hot water service.
“It’s a miracle no one was badly hurt because he could have hit another car or a pedestrian,” Ms Smith said.
“I had my three-year-old child with me so I came out on our balcony and called out ‘is my son in the car, is there a child I the car?’.
“People shouted out ‘yeah, there is’. And I said ‘well you’ve got to get him out’.”
Ms Smith said Jackson was in a bit of shock, but not hurt.
“The following morning he had a big blue lump on his forehead, but we got him checked out and he was all right.
“It’s just a miracle he’s OK and no one got injured.”
Jackson played rugby for Newport on Saturday _ and scored a try.
A resident of the apartment block, Patrick Wood, said he looked out the window and saw the car coming across the road and bump over the kerb.
“It then smashed through a big “For Sale” sign, through a row of plants and bounced its way over a wall and into the courtyard below us,” Mr Wood said. “It made a huge noise and everyone came out to have a look.
“A kid got out of the car. He was looking a bit distraught. He looked in shock.”
The NSW Fire & Rescue unit from Mona Vale arrived and turned off the electricity and gas supplies to the apartment, but reported there was no structural damage to the building.
Police said no one would be charged or fined over the incident.
It took another five days for a crane to be organised to lift the Falcon clear of the courtyard.
When the Manly Daily asked Jackson if he had any advice for children who get into the family car by themselves he said: “Don’t muck around with the gearstick.”