East Ohio police were very surprised last Sunday when they were called by anxious passersby to a local restaurant. Two small children had just entered the restaurant – the older one having driven the car into the restaurant parking lot.
When police asked if he knew how to drive the boy answered confidently that he knew how to drive, and he took his little sister to the local McDonald's to buy hamburgers for themselves. How exactly does he know how to drive? The eight year old explained: “I saw videos on YouTube explaining how to drive,” he told the police. “I know exactly what to do.”
The brother and sister, it turned out, had slipped out of the house under cover of darkness after their parents had gone to sleep.
During the 2 mile trip to the restaurant, the child successfully navigated around trucks, and crossed intersections according to traffic rules. Concerned passers-by called the police after seeing the little boy at the wheel, but they all admitted that the boy was careful to drive at the speed limit and did not violate any of the traffic laws.
When the brother and sister arrived at the restaurant, the boy used cash from his savings bank to pay for the burgers. “The restaurant workers thought the parents were in the back of the restaurant, but of course they weren't,” explains police officer Jacob Koehler, one of the police officers investigating the mystery.
A family friend who was in the area contacted the children's grandparents, who in turn contacted the parents. The brother and sister ate their hamburgers waiting for Father and Mother to pick them up.
Incidentally police will not open an investigation against the parents. They agreed that such independent initiative on the part of their children was totally unexpected and unforeseeable.”But this case was definitely instructive,” Koehler said, adding: “The way technology works today, kids can learn everything, this kid learned from the Internet how to drive. He watched a video for a few minutes and thinks he can drive.”