Extreme Drunk Driving

In December 2007, Terri Comer, 42, and also from Oregon, was arrested with a .72 blood alcohol level, nine times the state's legal limit.

Klanath County sheriff's deputies found the woman behind the wheel of her Toyota in a coma. Police said they removed the woman from her car and brought her to a local hospital for treatment. Photos of the scene show her car parked in a snow bank just feet from an electronic sign reminding drivers not to drink and drive.

"Levels between .4 and .5 are fatal in most cases," said Dr. Nicholas Pace, a professor at NYU School of Medicine and author of "Teens Under the Influence."

Related

Kegs, Drugs and Naughty Schoolgirls

Man Dies After Taking 23 Shots in 30 Mins.

"These situations involve people with incredibly high BAC levels but who nevertheless are functioning enough to get behind a wheel," Pace said. "For someone to be walking around with that much alcohol in their body, he has got to have an increased tolerance, which probably means he's an alcoholic."

"If a naïve drinker, an inexperienced drinker, had a BAC approaching those levels, he would normally die," he said.

A 100-pound male who consumes 10 drinks (12 oz. beers) in one hour still would only have a BAC of .374, just under the average level of lethality, according to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.

Pace estimated Kobierowski, the Rhode Island man, consumed 10 to 14 drinks over the course of an hour or two.

"A .1 might be after five drinks in an hour, reaction is greatly slowed, muscle control is impaired, they're uncoordinated. Seven to 10 drinks in an hour, you're losing bladder control. Somebody that drinks 10 to 14 drinks in an hour can really get into trouble, they're approaching the lethal range of .4 to .5," he said.

Other factors -- weight, gender, underlying medical conditions, the amount of food consumed while drinking -- can affect someone's BAC, said Dr. Lawrence S. Brown, a professor at the Cornell School of Medicine and senior vice president of the Addiction Research and Treatment Corp.

"With respect to high levels and lethality, all of the above mentioned are factors to consider, and you still have to account for the way the tests were done -- who calibrated the instruments and who performed the test. Those concerns have legal and clinical ramifications," he said.