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A mum drunk on vodka who lost control of her car in a high-speed crash as her toddler son sat in the back seat has been jailed for 26 weeks.

Tania Chikwature, 32, from Coventry, was three times over the limit when she crashed her Nissan Qashqai on the morning of 12 December.

A lorry driver who witnessed the crash, near Peterborough, claimed the car catapulted 14ft (4m) into the air.
Magistrates heard Chikwature had been up drinking the night before the crash.

Her 20-month-old son was unhurt although she sustained minor injuries.

Tania Chikwature admitted drinking and driving and dangerous driving

Magistrates were told Chikwature, of Butterfly Way, had been overtaking a lorry at speed on the A605 when she hit a roundabout and flew across it, clipping a tree, before landing on her roof, strewing debris across the carriageway.

Lorry driver Richard Jones, who captured the accident on his dash-cam, said: "I remember thinking as it launched into the air, 'they're not going to make it'."

The car can be seen flying over the top of the roundabout, clipping a tree

The car landed on its roof

He said the car went 14ft in the air.

"It cleared the roundabout, hitting a tree as it flew over it," he said. "I could see utter devastation."

The court heard a vodka bottle was found inside the car.

Chikwature refused a breath test at the scene but after submitting a blood sample, through back-calculation officers found she had 246mg of alcohol in 100ml at the time of the incident. The legal limit is 80mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood.

She was jailed for 26 weeks for dangerous driving and 12 weeks for drinking and driving, to be served concurrently, and was banned from driving for three years.

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