Re: OT: Some Words of Wisdom

Brady wrote:
Last night I was driving down a busy highway in my mini-van that's not really a mini-van. <snipped>
So the lesson here is: distracted driving *can* happen to you. I urge
everyone to refrain from using a cell phone (or Blackberry or any other wireless device) while driving. If it's an emergency, your caller will leave you a voicemail. Distracted driving *will* happen, and you won't even realize you were distracted until it's too late.

And that's my 'Words of Wisdom' for this weekend.

Pass it on.

Brady

Coincidentally, I was on my way to work this past Friday morning behind a large tree service truck. The driver just mindlessly ran the red light through the intersection and sure enough hit the driver's side a of a Toyota Corolla. He wasn't even slowing down and I just knew he would run the red light. He was probably going only about 30-35 MPH but it sure did enough damage. There was the sound of metal and glass, and the Toyota slowly recoiled back and crashed to a final stop when it hit a sign post on the corner. I stopped, parked my car and trotted to the scene to see if I could help. The driver was sitting the passenger's seat with no obvious injury. There were two young girls in the rear seats, about 10 and 12 years old. They had superficial lacerations, the younger with a bloody forehead. She was crying, but looked like she was going to be O.K. None were wearing seat belts. The little girl said "they don't work." I gave the mom my name and number as a witness. (I didn't tell them my occupation.) The truck driver was talking on the cell phone after the accident and his passenger had some blue paper towels which he gave to the little girls to use to apply pressure to their lacerations. The truck was leaking antifreeze all over the place, and the Corolla held up surprisingly well. The left side of the car was damaged, but it was mainly the drivers door that got bent badly. I didn't even consider the possibility of a distracting cell phone conversation to be the cause till you posted your story, Brady. Let's be careful out there.
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