Ikarus1
Avtomat Krishna-kov
I am one thankful essobie today. When you have a brush with losing everything important, it puts life into perspective real quick. Had one of those 'shit just got real' moments this week.
Some of you have met my 16 year old son Cameron. He's basically my doppleganger except for he has his mom's ginger looks. Otherwise he's all piss and vinegar and sarcasm just like his old man. And a better shot.
My youngest is much the same, but a bit more sensitive, more honest and caring. In other words he looks like me but he is more of his Mom's in spirit.
Cameron is 16 and a half, but he just got his drivers license. He's had his permit for ayear. We have really tried to get him all the seat time that we possibly could, and I tried like hell to get him into Doug Herbert's B.R.A.K.E.S. driving school. We did the same with my older daughter and she has done very well on the road.
He has about 250 hours driving experience, in various cars new and old, he can drive my 5 speed truck, and our urban assault Suburban equally well. I am not scared to ride with him anywhere, so it was getting to the point where I was confident enough to let him drive on I-40 home from the TN mountains last weekend.
He actually is going to be attending that school in October (I've been trying since April to get him in there!).
So last May I found him a decent used car, a 98 Honda Accord EX V6 loaded up with equipment, and miles.
We put some money in it (new tires, brakes, CV axles, etc etc) but still had a reasonable amount of money despite all that work. He put most of the new parts on it with me supervising. I posted here about the timing belt fiasco. Anyhow, it was his first car and he was proud of it. I drove the snot out of it to work to make sure it was really reliable.
Wednesday night we attended services like always, and even though I urged Cam to ride with us, he's a new driver with his own car, and he's had his license for a month. He drove separately by himself. Since provision licensees have to be home by 9PM, he left a bit before us around 8:30PM and took his brother with him.
We felt confident in him since he had made this trip before, and with us dozens of times already.
Cellphones were muted, and I usually kept mine on vibrate. However, 10 minutes after they left, my wife got a feeling and checked her phone. My youngest son was calling her, and so she stepped out to take the call.
About 30 secs later, I check mine and see that my oldest son has texted me that they were in an accident.
This is an absolute worst case nightmare for a parent, but since they both had contacted us, I knew that they were alive and able to communicate. My wife was in a panic, and we arrived at the scene in less than 10 minutes after it happened.
He was on a 4 lane hwy and had his cruise set on 60 ( I have stressed to him that we cannot afford any speeding violations since we have 2 teen drivers) which on that car means he was going around 55MPH.
Another provisional driver, a girl, in a Mini convertible, rolled the stopsigbon a side street, hesitated, and then pulled right out in front of him in the left lane.
Cameron said that he knew they were going to hit, and so he stood on the brakes as hard as he could. I'm not sure anybody could have done anything faster/better, and so he thinks they collided around 40MPH.
Anyhow, here are the results:
Some of you have met my 16 year old son Cameron. He's basically my doppleganger except for he has his mom's ginger looks. Otherwise he's all piss and vinegar and sarcasm just like his old man. And a better shot.
My youngest is much the same, but a bit more sensitive, more honest and caring. In other words he looks like me but he is more of his Mom's in spirit.
Cameron is 16 and a half, but he just got his drivers license. He's had his permit for ayear. We have really tried to get him all the seat time that we possibly could, and I tried like hell to get him into Doug Herbert's B.R.A.K.E.S. driving school. We did the same with my older daughter and she has done very well on the road.
He has about 250 hours driving experience, in various cars new and old, he can drive my 5 speed truck, and our urban assault Suburban equally well. I am not scared to ride with him anywhere, so it was getting to the point where I was confident enough to let him drive on I-40 home from the TN mountains last weekend.
He actually is going to be attending that school in October (I've been trying since April to get him in there!).
So last May I found him a decent used car, a 98 Honda Accord EX V6 loaded up with equipment, and miles.
We put some money in it (new tires, brakes, CV axles, etc etc) but still had a reasonable amount of money despite all that work. He put most of the new parts on it with me supervising. I posted here about the timing belt fiasco. Anyhow, it was his first car and he was proud of it. I drove the snot out of it to work to make sure it was really reliable.
Wednesday night we attended services like always, and even though I urged Cam to ride with us, he's a new driver with his own car, and he's had his license for a month. He drove separately by himself. Since provision licensees have to be home by 9PM, he left a bit before us around 8:30PM and took his brother with him.
We felt confident in him since he had made this trip before, and with us dozens of times already.
Cellphones were muted, and I usually kept mine on vibrate. However, 10 minutes after they left, my wife got a feeling and checked her phone. My youngest son was calling her, and so she stepped out to take the call.
About 30 secs later, I check mine and see that my oldest son has texted me that they were in an accident.
This is an absolute worst case nightmare for a parent, but since they both had contacted us, I knew that they were alive and able to communicate. My wife was in a panic, and we arrived at the scene in less than 10 minutes after it happened.
He was on a 4 lane hwy and had his cruise set on 60 ( I have stressed to him that we cannot afford any speeding violations since we have 2 teen drivers) which on that car means he was going around 55MPH.
Another provisional driver, a girl, in a Mini convertible, rolled the stopsigbon a side street, hesitated, and then pulled right out in front of him in the left lane.
Cameron said that he knew they were going to hit, and so he stood on the brakes as hard as he could. I'm not sure anybody could have done anything faster/better, and so he thinks they collided around 40MPH.
Anyhow, here are the results:
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