Car Accident!

There is a special place where RVer’s come from that seems to make them super people.  This afternoon, God sent us Dan and Kit from Red Deer, Alberta!

We had gone on a sight seeing trip, out in the desert to Gila Bend, Az.  We knew the place was nothing special to go to, but it was more about the trip not the destination. 

At about dark, we were returning on the I 8 highway and had turned on a two lane headed for Maricopa, Az.  In the dusk light I suddenly saw a roll of woven fence wire in my lane right in front of the car.  I instinctively swerved to miss the wire, worried that it would come right thru the windshield and hurt us.

The roll was four feet in diameter, and five or more feet long.  By swerving, I lost the back end of the car and just as though we were on ice, we were sliding sideways and then backwards.  As we left the road the wheels dug into the soft desert sand and over we went onto the top.  The front windshield broke, but stayed together because of the plastic laminate.

The back window shattered and glass flew everywhere. Miraculously, we stayed on our top and did not continue to roll.  Sand ground into the car from all directions.  The doors remained shut and were locked from the automatic locking function because we were in Drive gear.

Disoriented, we crawled from the car, as people had stopped and were helping us get out.  One of those folks were the Canadians from Red Deer.

It took the 911 folks over an hour to respond with a highway patrol unit, and an ambulance.  Once on the scene, they were very professional.  I had cut my knee on the broken glass and Loyce has several banged spots on her head and arms. 

The Lord rode with us in this crash, and decided it wasn’t our day to be hurt really badly.  I am humbled with this decision.

Our Canadian friends, stayed right by our side allowing Loyce to sit in the back of their car on the white leather interior.  We were covered in gravel.  They would not let us be in trouble with the loss of our car.  They were headed to Yuma, but immediately made arrangements to return us back to the RV here in Mesa Spirit.

They are RVer’s with a 42 foot motorhome, and also a sticks and bricks in Yuma.  The second they found out we were RVer’s, they stuck to us like we were family, helping us gather our belongings.  They will stay over night, with a friend here in Mesa, and return on their trip to Yuma in the morning. 

Our car is toast, but we are only banged up somewhat.  The Corolla is a bent up mess, but the passenger compartment, though smashed down onto the top of the seats, never seriously hurt us.   The engine stopped running, as we rolled, I presume from the fuel tank cut off. No fuel spilled from the tank and there was no fire.

Thank you Dan and Kit!!!!!  And all the other folks that stayed with us while we waited forever for the authorities to arrive.  

I’ll blog more when I get myself back in one basket.  Sitting here alive, seems strange, like perhaps I shouldn’t be.  I haven’t had that feeling, since I left Viet Nam.

Retired Rod