Airbag Appreciation Day
Until today, my appreciation for airbag technology was merely hypothetical. Now however it is firmly planted in first hand experience. First things first, everyone is ok to include the other driver that insists the accident was my fault. We’ll get to that later.
So…there I was (that was for you CSM Thompson) on my couch getting ready to watch my first Redskins game in a couple of weeks, I thank the National Guard for keeping my weekends occupied, and I’m pretty excited about the prospect of being a couch potato when my wife gives me a call.
So you know, Barbara has been out of town all weekend and is due back home this afternoon. She left Friday night after work to participate in an organized shopping trip in Atlanta with my sister, who lives in Tennessee.
She informs me she is at a gas station near an exit off of Interstate 75 about 30 miles south of Lexington (2 hours from home) and she believes she needs a tow truck. After a brief discussion, I concur. It appears her clutch has gone out and she can’t get the transmission into ANY gear. I do my best to instill a sense of calm and control. I tell her…give me a few minutes; I’ll get a hold of a towing company and be on my way to get you. After a few phone calls to arrange for her car to be policed up I head out.
I stop and top off my car with fuel (go figure) and I start towards the interstate. I get about 5 miles down the road and a car makes a left turn in front of me. Maybe I didn’t say that loud enough. I said…a car turns left RIGHT in front of me. Squealing breaks, a loud crash, bent metal, broken glass and plastic ensued. My car went airborne, when it came down it was on its side. It slid into a telephone pole and junction box as it came to rest. What a mess.
I pulled myself out of the car by climbing out the driver side door. That was a little tricky given the telephone pole and lines leaning against it, but thankfully a man came by to help. He held the wires out of the way while I pushed the door straight into the air.
The first call I made was to Barbara to inform her I wasn’t going to be able to come get her. She surprisingly (he says facetiously) wasn’t too concerned about herself, but more so the state of my car (again facetiously stated). No really she was great…she said she would find a way home, and indeed my industrious little lady did. The tow truck driver drove her to the airport in Lexington were she was able to rent a car. She has since made it home and I was brought home by the sheriffs department.
Back to the other driver. She said “I never saw you”. I said “I know, otherwise you wouldn’t have made a left turn in front of me.”. She asked me I can’t tell you how many times “Why did you hit me?”. My only response was, “Because you made a left turn right in front of me. I tried avoid you by slamming on my breaks and veering left, but you kept turning. There was nothing I could do to avoid it.” Apparently she told the sherrif it was my fault and I should have not ran into her. Needless to say, the cops assign fault to her. I had the right-of-way and she failed to yield. We’ll see what the insurance has to say once the police report is finished on Tuesday. I’ll keep you posted.
Take a look at these pictures.