How fast does that chair go?

Or: "Don't break the speed limit."

Ah, the clever things people say to you when you use a wheelchair.

In Ben Carpenter's case, the answer would be "50-mph":

Paw Paw police said the semi hit Carpenter's wheelchair as he was trying to cross from the north to south side of Red Arrow at Hazen Street at about 3:30 p.m. The driver of the truck, a 52-year-old Kalamazoo man whom police have not named, told authorities he'd been waiting at a red light and didn't see Carpenter. When the light turned green, he proceeded west on Red Arrow.

"I made a mistake," Carpenter said of his decision to cross the road. "A big mistake."

Carpenter said after the truck hit him, his wheelchair somehow turned frontward and its handles became stuck in the truck's grille. From there, police estimate, the truck reached speeds of 50 mph before pulling into a Ralph Moyle Inc. trucking facility in the 39200 block of Red Arrow.

"It's a good thing the place was only a couple of miles away," Carpenter said.

Check out the news video of Carpenter's story at MSNBC here.

This story is wild and funny, but being a wheelchair "pedestrian" is dangerous business. Unaccessible or nonexistent sidewalks (or construction without available alternative routes) often require wheelchair users to travel in the street. Even when there are ramps at street corners, they are often not placed so that they can be used without brushing the grill of a car, often a car where the driver is looking the other direction in anticipation of turning into the street. If there's one ramp per corner -- as opposed to one ramp per each side of a crosswalk -- it sometimes means that crossing the street involves flirting with the traffic zipping by on the green light. If ramps aren't maintained when streets are re-tarred, there can be such jarring bumps at the base of the ramp that staying in your seat is even tricky.

I've had my scooter clunked a few times by the bumpers of cars that move while I'm forced to use the ramp practically under their tires. I've even kissed the corner of a bus once. I had the right of way and was busy doing my damnedest not to kiss the underside of it too.

I'm glad Carpenter wasn't hurt. I wish it was safer for all of us out there.