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Terrible things seen on the road

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Philos

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Folks,

Sometimes we see terrible things while driving.

This is mine – yesterday. In Asda/Walmart car park there was a young lad sitting on the kerb with his head in his hands, staring down at his feet. Next to him was an enduro off road motorcycle, with no number plate. Standing over him were two police officers, one phoning somewhere and the other writing up the citation.

The lad had the body language of despair, and it was obvious from his look that he wasn’t legal. The lack of number plate was enough evidence of that, probably no insurance, MOT, or even driving licence. As the police couldn’t verify the ownership of the bike, they would have to take it in and probably arrest the lad. He was facing the whole book.

I’m not a judgemental type and we have all made mistakes in our lives. I was very sorry to see this lad facing up to his mistake.

A.
 
I saw a young adult (as the first witness to the site) in the car (stolen) he had just crashed (had been dragging with a friend in another car down the straight road, caught his tires in grass and swung the car right into a very ungiving masonary fixture), slightly convulsing and a little blood dripping from his nose, and clearly not going to be with us for much longer. It was reported he died later in the night.

I've also seen Trump/Pence signs along the road too.
 
I've seen a couple pretty gnarly accidents. The first when I was a young kid. It happened on a highway almost right in front of us. I don't remember much but I still remember the unconscious elderly man that was the driver laying in the exposed wreckage with his arms bent in ways arms aren't supposed to be bent in. My mother, being an RN, immediately got out to provide first aid. She said later that she didn't think either him or his wife would survive. This was the mid sixties so no seatbelts or much of any other safety features on cars.

The second was just a couple years ago. Four lane highway leading out to one of the townships. Speed limit 45. A late nineties Grand Prix crossed the center line and ran square into a trailblazer. The impact literally pushed the firewall of the GP back to the B pillar. Both occupants killed instantly. I often wonder if the driver did it on purpose. BTW, the people in the trailblazer had lots of broken bones but survived.
 
My wife and I were driving to the nearest city, about 100 Km away. About half-way, we were passing a pull-by, where I spotted a parked car and an old man doubled over, hanging onto the car, making his way back to the driver's door.
I thought, "He shouldn't be driving" and I was about to say to my wife that we should stop and help him, when HIS PANTS FELL DOWN!
I laughed for the next thirty miles. My wife thought I'd lost my mind.

Terrible for him. For us, not so much,

As an afternote, on our return trip, I spotted a pair of underwear on the ground where he had been. Gastrointestinal distress is a hard and random taskmaster.
 
Year ago, I was driving down the highway when I encountered a guy in a beater (old, beat-up vehicle) who was dragging a mattress box spring under his car. The box spring. The box spring made a fantastic lightshow, so I pulled up next to him and yelled at him until he pulled over.

As soon as he pulled over and stopped, the wind was no longer keeping the flames away from some flammable part of his car. Shortly after he exited the vehicle, the whole car went up in flames. I had no idea car fires were that hot. The gentleman said that he thought he could make it home, and could deal with the mattress there. Had I not convinced him to pull over, the car would have gone up in flames at the first stoplight.

The car was a complete piece of shit, so I'm sure getting a new one would have been a problem for the poor (double entendre intentional) guy. I'm not sure if he was drunk or just really stupid. I didn't say anything to the cops because
  1. I was certain he wasn't driving anywhere for the rest of the night and
  2. I figured the poor guy already had enough going wrong with his evening. If he was drunk, he learned the easy but expensive way that driving drunk is a really bad idea.
 
Two stories. A long time ago (about 1980) I saw a cyclist who had been hit by a car on a divided highway. His companions were yelling "Don't stand up," but he did anyway. His face was smashed in and blood was pouring out. I doubt he survived.

The second one was about ten years ago on a suburban interstate. It was raining heavenly and a minivan had lost control and slid across the median. We didn't see it actually happen, but when we got there we saw it smashed flat and wrapped around the front of a semi, about a foot or two off the ground. It was clear that no one inside could have survived and I saw in the newspaper the next morning that a husband and wife, both about 70 years old, had died.

Honorable mention goes to the time I (and a group of us) were the cyclists. As we were going up a hill a puppy started chasing us and a two-year-old ran after the puppy. At that instant a pickup truck came over the hill, brakes screeched, and there was loud thud. Luckily it was just the puppy that was hit, but the 30 seconds or so that we didn't know that was rather awful.
 
Artemus said:
Honorable mention goes to the time I (and a group of us) were the cyclists. As we were going up a hill a puppy started chasing us and a two-year-old ran after the puppy. At that instant a pickup truck came over the hill, brakes screeched, and there was loud thud. Luckily it was just the puppy that was hit, but the 30 seconds or so that we didn't know that was rather awful.
Click to expand...
I had to scratch from a Triathlon, so was watching near the finish line. A guy was racing by on the bike and at that moment a little kid went running across the relatively narrow roadway straight in front of him. There wasn't any time to react and the bike missed him probably by a foot or two, as every person watching at that moment had their hearts stop for a few beats.
 
I once saw a mother duck lead her ducklings across a road. The last duckling got run over, so she went back for him...the ducklings followed and more got killed and she kept going back and forth, and on went the massacre.
 
A few months ago, I was stuck in a major traffic jam driving south down Highway 101. I turned on the radio to get a traffic report and they said there was a motorcycle down in Mountain View. Finally, I get to Mountain View and see all the flashing police cars and EMTs ahead, and as I drive by, there's a lumpy yellow tarp on the ground with a couple of black boots sticking out the end. About 15 feet away as I passed by. Ruined my day. I read later that it was some young guy (28, I think) just starting to make a name for himself with some sort of media business. Sad.

Another time a few years ago, I was driving with a friend to his house after we got back from a road trip. Up ahead, two Boston Terriers run out in the road together, and the van in front of us hits one of them. There was no way to avoid it. The poor dog just tumbles around on the road. The other dog ran off scared. We stop the car and start knocking on doors to find the dogs' owner. Finally, we find the owner, who had no idea the dogs escaped his yard. We had to tell him the bad news and you could just see the look of despair on his face.
 
My dad and some of his army buddies (on leave) came upon a hideous car crash in Kentucky in 1941. A couple of local boys had run an old Model T into the back of a truck, and one of the boys had the top of his head sheared off. My dad saw most of a human brain where it had been pitched into the back of the car. And he told me this story throughout my childhood, probably from when I was about seven!!
What I saw on the highway outside of Tyler, Texas, back in '95 shook me so bad that I just can't bear to give a full description. It involved the death of a beautiful black Labrador retriever -- sorry, that's all.
 
I once saw a Lamborghini that someone had painted yellow. :shudder:
 
As a casualty claims adjuster with 38 years of experience, a substantial portion of which was in handling transportation claims, I have handled some grizzly scenes.

The most unusual were three confirmed vehicle suicides.

In the first the decedent was in a divorce, hung over the side of a bridge until a truck pulling doubles approached and he turned loose and fell in front of the truck.

Truck drivers don't expect pedestrians to fall out of the sky.

The second was a terminal aids victim who hid in the tall grass beside a highway until a truck got close at which time he ran out and sat down in front of the truck that hit him at about 60 MPH.

The third was a mental manic depressive who stood up at work and said, I am not coming back."

Indeed she was not.

She ran out in front of three cars that dodged her.

My client's truck hit her and that was that.

I was not at the scene but I did handle the aftermath.

The messiest that I saw the after effects of was a case in which a worker mishandled some dynamite and a pick up truck went off.

Some of what they could find of him was in a 40 gallon garbage bag when I arrived.

I went to a city hospital to see my wife who worked there and rounded a corner just in time to see a guy on a gurney come around a corner with a fence post stuck through his chest.
 
The day I received my WFR certificate (Wilderness First Responder) I was first on-scene to a double-fatal accident... that was a bad experience, but it didn't tweak me as badly as something that had happened years before. In the middle of the night, southbound on the Florida Turnpike, my car died. Scary spot, where there is a canal that runs parallel to the Turnpike, maybe 20 yards away. Tried to hitchhike for a little while but there was very little traffic, and this was in the late 60's, I had long hair etc, so nobody was going to pick me up. Finally gave up and started walking. A couple of miles later, a bobcst came within a few (probably 15) feet from me and started across the road, and one of the very few cars I had seen to that point nailed him, right in front of me. I was so shook that when I made it to a rest stop about an hour later, I was still shaking so badly that the mechanic at the garage grabbed me by the arm and made me sit down... he was sure I'd been in a crash. Still bothers me today - more than bloody dead human bodes for some reason.
 
We were driving home from the grocery store the other day, when we saw a very emaciated dog sitting in the middle of the road. We stopped and waited until a man was able to lure the dog safely across the street by offering her several pieces of the hot dog rolls that he had in a plastic bag. The dog looked so sad, and frightened, but hungry enough to take the bait and make it safely across the street. I really hope the man was planning on rescuing the skinny creature, but once the canine made it safely across the street, we slowly drove away. I see a lot of abandoned dogs where i live and that sometime brings tears to my eyes. I only wish I could save them all, but I know that I can't. I need to make a donation to the Humane Society this week, but all the rescue organizations in the world can't save all the animals that are victims of human cruelty.
 
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