Wheelchair Rider Zips Along on Autobahn

FRANKFURT, West Germany — An elderly man out for a ride in his battery-powered wheelchair, which has a maximum speed of 6 m.p.h., trundled for 30 minutes the wrong way up the autobahn in busy afternoon traffic Monday, police said.

Police who saw the 65-year-old pensioner trying to turn around in a rest area, said he told them that he had just noticed he had made a wrong turn. He said he was trying to reach the city of Giessen--which was behind him.

Police said he assured them that there was no cause for alarm. “I kept right,” he was quoted as saying. “I didn’t overtake anybody.”