The Crash
On the way home from work the other night we passed the scene of a car accident. The vehicle in question had both its front and rear ends smashed in and it was positioned across two lanes. There were no other cars involved, although one could easily be mistaken considering the amount of broken glass strewn across the road.
It must have taken extraordinary skill to crash the car in such a spectacular way, especially since the road was dry, well lit, flat and very straight.
As we passed by, I glanced out the window and noticed the driver sitting on the road barrier. I know it was the driver because he was inhaling his cigarette smoke so deeply that, if he let go, the cigarette might get sucked down his throat. His foot was also rapidly tapping the floor. Two sure signs. What also struck me was that the barrier was twisted horizontally, creating a perfect place to sit. How convenient. Why not make the most of a bad situation, sit down and have a smoke?
Wait a minute, this sounds a little too convenient, don’t you think?
I never studied the skid marks, car wreckage, road barriers, paint scrapings or the satellite images, but I have a strong feeling that the accident happened like this: the driver was drinking a coke from an over-sized open cup while talking on his cell phone to a friend about a passionate subject like, say, sport. The increasing speed of the car matched the increasingly heated debate about the effect of brand-name sport shoes on performance. The friend then dropped a bombshell: the driver's favorite player just announced that he will be switching to a rival team. In shock, the driver fumbled his phone, which fell on the floor and slid under his chair, just out of reach. That’s when the driver swerved across multiple lanes and lost control.
The front of the car clipped the barrier on one side of the road and spun around, narrowly missing an elderly pedestrian, a child with a ball and a family of cute yellow ducks. In his panic, the driver couldn’t remember what a relative who had taken an advanced driving course in the 1970s once told him about how to come out of a spin: should I brake hard, pump the brakes, accelerate into the spin, turn into the spin, turn out of the spin, keep the wheel straight…? So he tried all options and managed to increase his speed as his car collided with the barrier on the other side of the road, ricocheting off it like an elastic projectile.
As the scenery went by anti-clockwise, the driver realized that when the car finally comes to a halt, possibly upside down, he will have to be at the scene for some time. He then stopped groping under his seat for the phone so he could concentrate on maneuvering the car to impact the barrier at just the right angle. He managed to point the car at the barrier and flatten the metal sufficiently so that it would serve as a seat where he could wait comfortably until the tow-truck’s arrival.
Just a hunch.
It must have taken extraordinary skill to crash the car in such a spectacular way, especially since the road was dry, well lit, flat and very straight.
As we passed by, I glanced out the window and noticed the driver sitting on the road barrier. I know it was the driver because he was inhaling his cigarette smoke so deeply that, if he let go, the cigarette might get sucked down his throat. His foot was also rapidly tapping the floor. Two sure signs. What also struck me was that the barrier was twisted horizontally, creating a perfect place to sit. How convenient. Why not make the most of a bad situation, sit down and have a smoke?
Wait a minute, this sounds a little too convenient, don’t you think?
I never studied the skid marks, car wreckage, road barriers, paint scrapings or the satellite images, but I have a strong feeling that the accident happened like this: the driver was drinking a coke from an over-sized open cup while talking on his cell phone to a friend about a passionate subject like, say, sport. The increasing speed of the car matched the increasingly heated debate about the effect of brand-name sport shoes on performance. The friend then dropped a bombshell: the driver's favorite player just announced that he will be switching to a rival team. In shock, the driver fumbled his phone, which fell on the floor and slid under his chair, just out of reach. That’s when the driver swerved across multiple lanes and lost control.
The front of the car clipped the barrier on one side of the road and spun around, narrowly missing an elderly pedestrian, a child with a ball and a family of cute yellow ducks. In his panic, the driver couldn’t remember what a relative who had taken an advanced driving course in the 1970s once told him about how to come out of a spin: should I brake hard, pump the brakes, accelerate into the spin, turn into the spin, turn out of the spin, keep the wheel straight…? So he tried all options and managed to increase his speed as his car collided with the barrier on the other side of the road, ricocheting off it like an elastic projectile.
As the scenery went by anti-clockwise, the driver realized that when the car finally comes to a halt, possibly upside down, he will have to be at the scene for some time. He then stopped groping under his seat for the phone so he could concentrate on maneuvering the car to impact the barrier at just the right angle. He managed to point the car at the barrier and flatten the metal sufficiently so that it would serve as a seat where he could wait comfortably until the tow-truck’s arrival.
Just a hunch.
You were close. I wasn't talking about sport...I was arguing with my friend about road safety - he said I should pull over but I insisted that driving with a mobile in one hand is perfectly safe...turns out he was right...and just so you know, I only took up smoking after the crash...
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