Car Accident in Heavy Snow
201102327 Kwang-Jin Lee
Have you ever experienced a car accident? It always occurs in the twinkling of an eye. And all the result of the accident is decided in such a short time. It can be a total disaster, or such a miracle.
When I was 5th grade in the elementary school, my family lived in Boulder, Colorado. And when the winter vacation started, my family went on a vacation to the south-west region of the US by car. We toured lots of cities and attractions for about two weeks and soon the day to return came.
My parents woke me and my younger sister up very early in the morning. "Wake up," dad said. "We have to leave here early so that we can reach Boulder tonight. It will be a long journey from here." So my family ate breakfast really fast and hurried our way back home on the highway. When the evening came, we were on the left side of the Rocky Mountains but still had to cross such a high mountains. And while going across the mountains, it started to snow and became very heavy as the night came. Soon, our visions were limited to nearly 3~4 meters and the entire world seem to be just white. Also, the highway was very steep and slippery. So mom seemed to be worried. "It's snowing too much," mom said. "Let's find an inn and return home tomorrow. It's too dangerous." But my dad said, "But our kid's second semester starts tomorrow. They have to go to school." Mom tried to persuade dad that safety is more important, but dad didn't agree.
Dad drove the car up to the top of the mountains. And after we reached the continental divide, we started to go downhill. But it was more dangerous to go down than to go up because the car could easily slip forward. "I've got to step on the brake pedal carefully," dad said. There were no guardrails beside the highways but just dangerous cliffs. So I broke out into a cold sweat. The outside of the car was full of darkness with heavy snowing. Snow on the road piled heavily that I couldn't even recognize the boundary of the highway and cliff.
"Be careful!" All of a sudden, our car slipped and became out of control. We were all stunned worrying that we might fall down to cliff, but fortunately, there was some space where we slipped to, similar space like the shoulder of the road. Anyway, we could avoid falling down the cliff, but became stuck in snow on the right side of the road.
"Ah, the wheels can't get traction in such a deep snowbound," dad said. But until then, although he seemed a little disappointed about this situation, nothing seemed dangerous. "Don't worry, kids," dad said. "I'll go out for a short time to see our situation more in detail." And he went out of the car and wondered around to know exactly about our situation. After that, he opened the door and tried to come in. "Hey, th……"
"Clunk!" In an instant, a car which was passing by slipped and crashed into the side of our car. "Ah!" my sister cried out. I was so horrified that I couldn't even scream. The door beside the driver's seat was torn off and Dad was bleeding in his left hand. "Are you alright?" my sister cried. But though he was bleeding, what he tried to do was to relieve us. "I'm OK. I'm OK," he said.
Fortunately, no one was seriously injured. Because the car crashed toward side of the front wheel, dad wasn't directly hit by the car. He was bleeding just because he got a cut in his finger when the door was tearing off. And other people including me were totally safe. It was just a miracle to be completely safe even if our car were hit so hard!
After dad calmed us down, he patiently called the 911 and tow truck. "I'll go to the hospital alone," dad said to mom. "You take our kids home and take some rest." "OK. Take care," mom said. "I'll go to you after I take our kids home." We took a seat in the tow truck and our broken car was pulled behind.
It was sudden and terrible accident, but I think we were quite lucky. Right side of our car located such an endless cliff and if the other car crashed other part of our car, we might have been pushed to the cliff. Then, I would not be able to write about this experience.
And I've got some lesson from it. I never doubted that my parents would be with me forever. But after the accident and critical situation that might make me lose someone in family, I realized the importance of my dad, mom and my sister. Also, I learned that just living a life itself should be considered priceless. And I was very surprised that dad was so patient with the sense of responsibility for family. I became more respectful to my dad.
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