Saturday, January 17, 2009

Another Late Friday

I'm no different that any other person who has a career.  When Friday rolls around I'm happy my weekend has arrived and look forward to my time off.  

I've been doing this job longer than 15 years and less than 30 years, and when Monday comes around again I'm not thinking of a new excuse I haven't used yet to get out of work.  Come Monday I'm ready to hit the streets and provide some education through enforcement.

Now back to Friday.  It typically never fails that happy drivers, eager drivers and in a hurry drivers occur more on Friday than any other day of the week as they are ready to start their weekend just like me, well almost like me.

Its a rarity that I get off on time on Fridays, why?  Because these happy, eager and in a hurry drivers are thinking about what plans they have for Friday night or any other night or day of their weekend.  This means that they are paying more attention to their "mental daydreams" than they are about keeping their eye on the roadway.

Sometimes its nothing other than someone driving Head Up Ass, especially young, new drivers.
Even more so when they have a group of friends in the car with them egging them on.

Let me give you a "for instance".  

Johnny Nudriver hears the end of school day bell and races to the parking lot where several of his friends are waiting for him.  Now Johnny is cool because Daddy Nudriver doesn't want poor Johnny to have to actually exercise his legs by riding a bicycle or walking to and from school.  

Daddy Nudriver wants to look cool too.  So he gives Johnny the keys to his late model (and I really mean late model as in new car smell late model).  

So in pile all of Johnny's friends and this late model sedan is packed with five persons ages 16 to 18.  Mind you Johnny has plenty of experience.  He's had his driver license since December of 2008!

For those of you not from California, we have this provisional restrictions for new drivers for their first year or until they're 18.  The law does not allow these young inexperienced drivers to have passengers and they are not allowed to drive between the hours of 11:30 pm to 5:00 am.  There are some exceptions to the passenger rule and driving between the restricted hours but those exceptions didn't apply to Johnny.

The intent behind this law is good.  If Johnny had no passengers in his car, he may have not felt the need to show off.  In turn his "buddies" would not have felt obligated to egg him on with his HUA driving.

So here they all are traveling at a very excessive speed having the time of their lives, enjoying their "E-ticket" ride!  Johnny doesn't realize the laws of gravity, coefficients of friction (how well you tire sticks to the roadway) and centrifugal force let alone when to slow down and try using that pedal just to the left of the long skinny one.

So the roadway has a sweeping left curve and Johnny is traveling on a downgrade.  Woo Hoo!!!  Hands up in the air everybody, you know just like on the roller coasters.

So as the roadway curves to the left, Johnny Nudriver's speed causes the car to break its grip on the roadway.  The cars slides sideways (after spinning 180 degrees in a clockwise motion and facing the wrong damn direction) and cages (bends inwards) both the front and rear left side tires.  

The tires slide onto the grass and soft dirt which causes the car to "trip" or begin rolling over side to side.  To make matters worse, where Johnny's sedan left the roadway leads into a gently sloping ravine.  

"This is Captain Johnny speaking.  If you look out the windows to your right, you'll see the roadway we just launched from.  Looking to you left you'll see our destination.....please notice the no smoking sign is on and oh by the way please ensure your seat belts are fastened properly.  Thank you for flying the friendly skies with HUA airlines.

As the flight continues....."Please take a moment to look out your window as we'll be landing shortly where you'll be able to see the sky, grass, sky, grass, sky, grass and there we go, sky.  Don't forget you carry on baggage and please come again I appreciate your business.

Luckily everybody had their seat belts on.   As the car rolled, the passenger and driver doors opened with nobody ejected.  

As I rolled up to the scene, I could see the tire scrubs left by the car to the edge of the sloping hill which led down to the ravine.  I walk over to the edge and see that amazingly the car came to rest on its wheels.  The fire department was already on scene.

Believe this!  All four passengers and driver had no major injuries.  Out of the five persons, two were transported to the local hospital where they were treated for their minor injuries and released.

Johnny Nudriver was not injured but appeared visibly shaken as I spoke to him.  I told Johnny after taking his statement for my lengthy traffic collision report, that I will be issuing him a citation for driving at an unsafe speed and for violating his provisional driver license restrictions.  Johnny understood because I told him why I would be citing him.

Daddy Nudriver arrived on scene and nutted up! (truly an understatement).  Daddy Nudriver got into Johnny's face and jumped in his shit.  To kind of get Daddy Nudriver to calm down I put things in perspective to him.

I told him that I understood his anger, but we can replace cars, that's why we have insurance.  We don't have insurance policies to replace our loved ones in our lives when they are taken from us.  I added, it's much better to see your son standing in front of you unscathed where you can reach out and hug him, rather than sitting in a chair next to a gurney holding the cold hand coming from beneath a yellow medical blanket of someone who was near and dear to you.

The outcome to this solo vehicle collision is miraculous to say the least.  There were some Angels riding in that car protecting those kids who, thankfully have their whole lives ahead of them.


1 comment:

  1. "Guardian Angels" indeed. Good thing their mothers told them to buckle up. Otherwise you'd likely still be searching for them in the ravine, ejected to Gods knows where.

    HM

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