New Brunswick man wakes in Sackville while driving home for holidays, bypasses province completely

Sackville — A recent New Brunswick expat has inexplicably lost his memory of driving the entire length of the province while attempting to return to Saint John for the holidays last week.

Mid-morning Wednesday, a man walked into the Wendy’s restaurant in Sackville and asked the employee where he was.

“He didn’t seem right on his feet, and his balance was all off,” said Rita Michaels, who was working at Wendy’s at the time. “I think his car was parked sideways in the drive-thru. He bumped into the condiment counter and got ketchup on his elbow.”

The man was rushed to nearby Sackville Memorial Hospital for examination. According to initial reports, he was on his way back to Saint John for the holidays from his job in Montreal. The man’s last memory of the trip was of crossing the Quebec border in Edmundston. Dr. Max Turcotte was on duty when he was brought to the hospital.

“He was very confused, very confused. He asked repeatedly if the police had found the discount 2-4s he brought from Quebec under the coats in his back seat,” explained Dr. Turcotte. “He asked me for a smoke and I told him he was in a hospital; he got a little mopey after that. He told me he came to just when he was passing those huge radio towers out on the Tantramar and couldn’t figure out where he was.”

This is not the first reported incidence of drivers reporting memory loss and mental breakdowns on New Brunswick roadways. Nine drivers were found in what police have coined “scenery stasis” on the TransCanada Highway between Fredericton and Moncton last summer when the optical illusion of unchanging scenery caused them to think they were driving when they were actually sitting still on the side of the road. In 2012, a Bangor man was found wandering the streets of a residential Quispamsis neighbourhood asking where Halifax was.

The man remains in the Sackville hospital for further observation.