This weekend we went to Dave and Char's for their son's 2nd birthday (and to visit them too ;)). It was a fun weekend overall, except that it rained, meaning we were pretty well confined to their apartment.
Anyway, we left yesterday (Sunday) about 4:00 or so in the afternoon. It was still raining, and we wanted to make sure we'd get home at a decent hour given the conditions.
So we drove along, through Hartford and up I-91. The rain kept coming, and the roads were pretty nasty.
Suddenly, just before Exit 40 in Windsor, CT, about 15 yards ahead of us a car in the far left lane fishtailed left and then swerved right. At that point there are four lanes plus an "Exit Only" lane for Exit 40; the car crossed all four lanes, doing a full clockwise spin. It hit the right post of the exit sign and slid through the slick, triangular patch of grass between the highway and the exit ramp, leaving long, muddy tire tracks in the wet ground.
Having slowed nearly to a stop already, I asked Hil, "Should we see if he's alright?"
"Yeah."
She pulled over to the median (we had been in third lane, numbering from the right) shortly beyond where the card had gone of the road. I jumped out and ran back, not knowing whether the driver and any passengers was hurt. As I did, the driver's door opened, and I saw a hand poke out and wave. By the time I got to the door, the driver had swung his legs out and was just sitting there looking dazed.
I asked if he was alright, and he said he thought so. He trembled somewhat as he spoke. I asked if he needed to call anyone. He replied that he wasn't sure what he should do – should he call the police? some friends?
After a few minutes of making sure he was okay, I walked back to our minivan to get a paper and pen. While there, Hil told me that she had dialed 911, and the operator told her that the incident had already been reported by several people. Cops were on the way. I wrote down our names and cell phone number, and walked back to give it to the guy, telling him that if he needed anyone as a witness for insurance or a police report or anything, to give us a call.
At that point (probably only about five minutes after the original incident), there was still some smoke coming from the wheel-wells of his car. He wondered if the cause was something else. He tried starting his car, and it turned over with no hassle. We looked under the hood and couldn't find any visible signs of smoke there. I touched the driver's side tire and it was fairly warm, but not burning hot. After a few more minutes, the smoke was gone.
It took the first cop car quite awhile to arrive. It was a City of Windsor unit and he almost drove past us on the exit ramp. When we saw him, we walked over and talked for a few minutes. The guy told the cop what had happened and the cop replied that we would need to wait for the state police, since it was an interstate highway, and that the guy would probably have to pay for the sign.
I went back to our minivan to update Hil. It was still raining out (though, not extremely hard), and cars continue to drive past us at a pretty good clip. I thought briefly that it would really suck if the same thing happened to someone else while we were still there.
While waiting for the state police to arrive, I realized at one point that I had never introduced myself or asked the driver's name. So, I remedied that. He gave his name as Andy and said he was the director of a camp in Western Mass. called Shire Village. He was driving there after having been at a cousin's wedding in NYC earlier that day.
(When describing Shire Village, I thought Andy had deemed it a "hippie village" – to which I nodded and smiled knowingly with, "Ahhh, Shire Village"; he just grinned back and said, "Exactly" – but the website doesn't really give that impression. It seems quite similar to other childrens' camps I've seen. Maybe I misheard him.)
Anyway, the state police showed up a few minutes later. After spending about a half hour in drizzling rain, Andy and I both were getting a little anxious to leave (as was Hil in the van – fortunately both of our girls were asleep), but I didn't want to ditch him either. You never know how cops are going to react. You'd like to think that they'd take one look at the roads – it had been raining all weekend, remember – but there's always that one jerk who will give a person a hard time. I wanted to make sure that Andy had at least one person to back up his story.
Fortunately, when the state cop arrived, the accident report took about five seconds to complete. Here's how the conversation went between Andy and the cop:
- The Cop
- Are you hurt?
- Andy
- No.
- The Cop
- Is the car driveable?
- Andy
- Yes.
- The Cop
- Ok, you can go. Drive slower.
- Andy
- That's it?
And that was that. The cop nodded to me, and I gave a "ok, cool" shrug of the shoulders. I shook Andy's hand and said I was glad he was alright.
Hil drove slower after that too.
curtis listened to Toad the Wet Sprocket – Rings 10:41am#
curtis tweeted "ha! If only they had AV software in ancient Ilion http://tr.im/F6xd #funny #history #pics" 7:56pm#
curtis Curtis Forgot milk. Anyone got an opinion about Yeungling and Cheerios? 6:52pm#