www.CostaRicaTicas.com

http://www.nacion.com/2013-02-22/Suceso ... beria.aspx

I was on my way to Liberia yesterday afternoon and traffic was at a complete stand-still long before I reached the airport. I ended up turning around and not going to my destination in Liberia.

This morning I have come to find out that the cause for the delay in traffic was due to a mortality near the entrance to the airport. In Costa Rica during an accident if there is a mortality the body cannot be moved until a judge arrives and declares the person deceased. It took several hours to complete this process yesterday. Furthermore, I came to learn via the national newspaper, La Nacion, that the deceased was an American on vacation who was driving a rental car. There were two vehicles involved in this accident and both were American tourists in rental cars. The driver of one vehicle was trying to pass a bus (there is a normal stop for a Pulmitan de Liberia bus very close to where his accident occurred) while attempting this pass he collided head-on with the second vehicle.

The victim was attended to by a paramedic who was near the accident on his return trip to a home base in Nicoya but it was unsuccessful.

Please!!!! If you are here on vacation and you rent a car, BE CAREFUL! Outside of San Jose the locals will set a terrible example and pass around curves, uphills, and combinations of the two! USE COMMON SENSE and be PATIENT!!!! At the end of the day it is never worth your life to get somewhere 15 minutes faster. The vast majority of highways in Costa Rica are two lane roads once you get out of the San Jose metropolitan area. And in the cases of multiple lane highways, many do not have a median protecting you from oncoming traffic.

Take your time, use common sense and make sure you can come back and enjoy future vacations!

Horrible. Here it is in google translate. Passing in CR is Russian Roulette. I think sometimes that double yellow means pass to Ticos although if you believe the news item, maybe Mr. Schumacher wasn't careful. Regardless, I hope for his family that he had the travel insurance covering repatriation of his remains.

"Schumacher Barry Griffith, 68, was killed this afternoon in a traffic accident in front of the Daniel Oduber International Airport in Liberia, Guanacaste.

The cars were destroyed and there was great congestion. The death was the result of a collision with a Suzuki Celerio of Schumacher colliding with a Toyota Yaris.

In both cars there were two occupants. The other three injured were taken to hospital in Liberia in delicate condition ", said the traffic officer, Cesar Cisneros, who attended the accident.

Cisneros said, with preliminary data that the now deceased, a native of the United States, traveling with a sense of Liberia to Santa Cruz, made an improper overtaking a bus and found himself faced with the oncoming Yaris.

The man died at the scene. A paramedic from Nicoya was passing and tried to revive him but was unsuccessful.

The mishap caused rows for miles as authorities closed the entire way.

A "Suzuki" trying to pas a bus???? Geeeez. Do those tin cans even accelerate beyond a couple mph? A death trap in my opinion.