We left Phoenix early that afternoon, driving north on I-17 toward Sedona. One of conversation topics during the drive was the value of exciting/funny/interesting life experiences. Past stories that came up included James's pizza delivery adventure of 2007 and, less recently, his "messy" running incident in 2000 (if you've heard the story, you know what I'm talking about; if you haven't, you may or may not want to ask James about it...). Little did we know, excitement was about to find us. I guess we should have noticed the signs (quite literally) fate was trying to throw our way. This was the exit just a few miles south of our little "incident":
We continued north, James sitting in the passenger seat and Mom behind him in the back seat. As I drove in the left lane, going around 70mph, we heard a loud pop, and I knew immediately that the back left tire had blown out. As soon as it happened, the car veered sharply to the right and started to spin. In a fraction of a second, we were sliding to the north/northeast, facing south, and headed directly for a wall of rock just off the shoulder of the interstate. Unfortunately for me, the driver's side was lined up for a direct impact with the rock, and the image of the rapidly approaching rock is still burned into my retinas. Strangely enough, the thought of death didn't even cross my mind as the car slid toward the wall, though looking back, that wouldn't have been an unreasonable concern. My only thought was sheer hope that I wouldn't end up with any injuries that would require any serious rehabilitation. Before I could really process what was about to happen, we collided with the rocks, the car rolled, and finally came to a stop on the roof.
James asked if everyone was okay, and we were all able to speak, which seemed encouraging. At this point we were hanging upside-down in our seat belts, and James yelled that he saw gas leaking and told me to shut the car off. I glanced toward the back of the car and thought I saw some liquid dripping down, too. It was around this time that the thought of dying in burning car entered my mind for the first time...
I turned the ignition off and reached to unbuckle my seat belt. I was completely alert throughout the accident, yet the only part I can't remember is getting myself unbuckled and falling onto the ceiling of the car (even as I write this, "falling onto the ceiling" still sounds strange). James had his door partially open, and I didn't even bother trying mine. Looking at the car later, it was resting at a slant, and my door was wedged into the ground and wouldn't have moved anyway. As I got myself oriented on my hands and knees on the ceiling of the car, I noticed quite a bit of blood...but I was moving, so I felt pretty good about things.
In a move that some later described as a true George Costanza moment, I managed to somehow make it out of the car first, squeezing past James and through his partially open passenger door in front of him. I guess the threat of an explosion really had me motivated for a quick exit...and for the record, I only got out first because I felt that I was best prepared to help to those still trapped in the car.
I got stuck a little around the waist, but I was out, though I added some cuts on my back as I squeezed through the door. James was right behind me and was out of the car in a few moments. Mom was still in the back seat and her door wouldn't budge. We were still concerned about the possibility of an explosion, so started preparing to kick the glass out of her window. She made it to the front of the car, though, and started pushing through the narrow opening. James dug at the gravel that was keeping the door from opening wider, and I grabbed Mom's hands and pulled her out.
We walked away from the car, mostly just thrilled to be walking away from the car. A few vehicles had pulled over, and a guy in an SUV called 911 and waited with us. I had a lot of blood coming from my knees, elbows, and hands, plus a very slight headache. The hat and sunglasses I'd been wearing were nowhere to be found. James had some cuts on his knees that looked similar to mine, and Mom felt a little dizzy and was covered in my blood.
While I stood there by the interstate, spitting glass and gravel out of my mouth, I was shocked at how quickly everything had happened. In a span of about 15 seconds I had gone from driving down the highway, wondering when I should eat that next piece of leftover pizza in the back seat, to being one of those people, bleeding by the side of the interstate while gawkers slowly drive by. The whole thing was just so unexpected. The pedestrian equivalent would be walking down the sidewalk on a quiet, beautiful day and having the pavement jump up and shove you into a tree trunk at seventy miles per hour...
A patrolman arrived first, asked a few questions, and mentioned that he was surprised that we'd all made it out of the car so quickly (looks like George Costanza was a hero, after all). The ambulance wasn't too far behind, and I mentioned my slight headache to the paramedics. They didn't want to take any chances, of course, so they put me in a neck brace, strapped me to an orange board, and told me to remain motionless as much as I could. James felt fine aside from his cuts and scrapes, so he refused medical treatment and came along for the ambulance ride with me, and Mom followed behind in a second ambulance. Before riding off in the ambulance, James snapped a photo of the car with his cell phone, one of the more memorable shots from the trip:
Unfortunately, Sedona doesn't have a hospital with a trauma center, so instead of receiving a (very expensive) shuttle to our original destination, we turned around and headed south on I-17, over the same ground we'd just driven (...and spun and rolled), back to Phoenix. The paramedic hooked me up to an IV and started cleaning my assorted wounds. My headache didn't last long and was soon replaced with the dull pain from the forty-five minute drive with my head strapped to a board.
All things considered, I was feeling pretty good, and James continued to take pictures inside the ambulance. We talked with the paramedic and joked around a little on the ride back to Phoenix...I asked the paramedic what they do if the ambulance crashes on the way back to the hospital. He didn't seem to find it very funny.
They took us to Deer Valley hospital, and the paramedics moved me onto a cart and wheeled me to a room. James walked to the waiting room (still taking some great photos), and a few of the other paramedics carried our bags into my room. As I parted ways with him I said, "I'll see you during visiting hours."
Two very profound thoughts crossed my mind around this time:
(1) Since I was still wearing the neck brace, the only thing I really got a good look at was the ceiling. I asked myself why hospitals don't spend more time decorating their ceilings. Do patients who narrowly escaped death really want to look at plain, old, white ceiling tiles? I doubt it.
(2) Are you supposed to tip a paramedic if he carries your bags? What's the protocol--is it like a hotel? I couldn't reach my wallet and it was probably covered in blood anyway, so I decided that I'd have to research that one later. I figured I'd keep my comments about their under-decorated ceilings to myself for the time being, too. But some sky-blue accents or something similar would have been appreciated....
I spent the next five hours getting poked, x-rayed, and cleaned up, with long stretches of sitting and watching TV. The cuts on my right knee required stitches, so I got a few numbing shots and the doctor started sewing away. I didn’t bother asking how many I got (I later found out it was two stitches in one spot and four in another)...nor did I bother actually watching much of the actual stitching process. The doctor described my left knee as "ground beef," but somehow that didn't require stitches. That imagery didn't exactly do wonders for my normally generous appetite, either. On the bright side, as I waited around I got to watch most of the second half as the Lakers won game 2 of the NBA Finals...and I'm proud to announce that I’m now up-to-date on my tetanus shots.
The doctors eventually let me get up and walk around, and I visited Mom in another room. She was in better shape than me and somehow didn't have a single cut (all that blood on her clothes was mine), so I started the long, painful process of calling the insurance company and trying to track down a new rental car. When we finally tracked down James again, a nurse was stitching a big cut on his upper shin, but he was otherwise okay. He easily surpassed my six stitches with eleven of his own, plus he'd continued to document his stint in the waiting room, his injuries, and the stitching process with his camera. I wish I could have seen the faces of the other people in the waiting room while he sat there covered in blood...
The bad news was that we couldn’t get a replacement rental car until the next day, so we were stuck in Phoenix without a hotel or any form of transportation. We eventually booked a crappy hotel not too far from the hospital and Mom’s nurse, whose shift ended at 10PM, was incredibly nice and offered to give us a ride to our hotel. We weren't in much of a position to turn her down, so we went took her up on it. On the way, she even made a stop at Wal-Greens so we could get fill our pain medication prescriptions.
Our experience in Wal-Greens was certainly near the top of the list of most entertaining experiences on the trip. Keep in mind, we had just been released from the hospital. I had huge white bandages wrapped around both knees, one on my elbow, and one on my left hand. James had a similar oversize bandage on his right knee and was still wearing his blood-stained clothing. He and I were both limping on our right legs, and all three of us still had our hospital bracelets on. We must have looked like cage-fighting mummies between the blood and the bandages. A cashier asked us if we'd beaten each other up, and our "unique" appearance gave us the power to part seas of customers like something straight out of the bible.
When we finally arrived at our hotel, we took an inventory of our possessions. Somehow my GPS, which had been suction-cupped to the windshield during the accident, still worked perfectly, though it had picked up more than it's share of scratches. The paramedics apparently found the suction cup somewhere in the car and stuck it in one of our bags, but the mounting clip was missing. My camera and laptop both worked perfectly and looked as good as new.
To anyone from Garmin, HP, or Sony who might stumble upon this post: for the right sum, I'm more than willing to promote the durabilty of your products--I think it would make a great commercial. Oakley, I'm slightly less impressed with your product quality: the sunglasses I'd been wearing during the accident, originally lost, ended up in James's bag. The frames were bent badly, though that brought some resolution to the mystery of the strange bruise on my nose...
Before going to bed, I tried to pick as much glass out of my hair and ears as I could. Unable to shower because of the stitches, I ended up battling those tiny glass shards for the better part of the next two days. I slept pretty well that first night, even though my right leg wouldn't bend much, and I was pleased to disover the next morning that the pain had not, as the doctors warned, gotten significantly worse overnight.
The next day began with (and was mostly consumed by) a painfully boring ten hour wait in the breakfast area of our half-star hotel before we finally got a replacement rental car. That evening we drove to the junkyard and got a look at the car as we searched the interior for our last few missing items. At first glance the car didn't look as bad as we'd expected, but the roof was certainly shocking. I still wonder where my head was during the accident and how it was't entirely crushed...
We recovered the last few missing possessions, including that GPS clip that had disconnected from the suction cup. We also snapped some haunting pictures of our blood stains on the ceiling, seats, and doors of the car, but we were thrilled with the overall outcome--after all, we were hiking again, stitches and all, not even two days after the accident.
Before writing this off as a miraculous survival story, though, it's worth noting that not everyone survived that day. Three pieces of thick, delicious pizza perished in the shoulder along northbound I-17 on that hot summer afternoon. Flowers and cards are welcome (and very appropriate), and I appreciate all of your thoughts and prayers for those three deep-dish casualties.
A few people have asked if I was nervous getting in a car or driving after this whole ordeal, and the answer is no. Somehow, I found it surprisingly easy to get back in the car after that. After all, what are the odds that's going to happen twice? I will admit, though, that I'm a little more obsessive about checking my tire pressure these days...
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