Yes, You Can Be Arrested for Drink Driving an Esky

In Australia, many people are arrested for drink driving every weekend. Most them arrested for drink driving in a car, but some are arrested for drink driving a motorised esky. On Saturday night, a 20-year-old Melbourne man met this fate.

The man, accompanied by several friends, was allegedly caught with a blood concentration reading of 0.041. He was riding a standard blue and white motorised beer cooler, and received two fines from local police: $389 for the drink driving offence, and $777 for using an unregistered vehicle. He also lost his probationary driver's licence for three months, and will presumably have to find some form of non-esky transport during this time.

Retailing for around $600 and boasting a four stroke pull start motor and one litre fuel tank capacity, motorised eskys provide their owners with the luxury of storing and consuming alcohol, while moving. You can't say they weren't invented for this purpose, but then utilising one at 11 PM on a Saturday night probably isn't a great idea.

Since their invention and subsequent rise in popularity among 20-year-old guys in outer suburbs, motorised eskys have been casing problems nation wide. In April, a man was arrested for drink driving a motorised esky in the suburb of Wanneroo. In November 2015, a group of friends took the "putting motors on things" craze a couple of steps further by driving a motorised picnic table down a highway while enjoying a six pack of Coronas. Another Perth man ambitiously added a motor to his La-Z-Boy in June.

Perhaps they're worried about the trend continuing, but Victorian police took the weekend's incident as an opportunity to educate other potential motorised esky drivers:

"To have this young man riding around poorly lit streets whilst alcohol affected, with no vehicle lights and not wearing any protective equipment, it's simply a recipe for disaster," Leading Senior Constable Adam Dickenson posted on the Eyewatch Yarra Ranges Facebook page.

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