Car Accident!!!
Well, I had a bit of excitement this afternoon on my way home from work. I was driving down a 4 lane divided highway when someone decided to make a left turn right in front of me. I couldn’t avoid them because the distance was so close, so we collided. While I have been in other, minor, car accidents this one was the first I had been in where the speed was in excess of 35 MPH and air bags were deployed.
I think I’m OK so far although I have a lot of soreness in my knee and shoulders and some abrasions on my arms from the airbag plus I was a bit shaken up after the collision. I decided not to take a backboard ambulance trip to the hospital though. I’ll probably go see my primary care physician tomorrow just to make sure all is well.
My van, which was rather old, was pretty much totaled by the accident. It was maybe worth $1000 or so before the accident. The real pain in the butt was that I had just put brand new tires on it a couple of weeks ago and I had just filled it up with $3.95 a gallon gasoline yesterday. That sucked.
I’m going to be looking for a new vehicle over the next few days. I’m kind of torn here. I like the idea of a bigger vehicle like a mini-van. I feel safer in one particularly after this accident. Although, with gas most likely going over $4 a gallon, a smaller car might be a better choice. I will be buying used and cheap though. Feel free to throw out your suggestions for a replacement vehicle in the comments.
wo! hope you are really okay. better get a proper checkup.
can’t suggest much about the choice of vehicle though.
Take care mate.
Thanks Costa,
Hopefully I’ll be able to get a doctor’s appointment this morning.
We tend to drive long distances here in the US as compared to other countries and this is especially true here in the Atlanta GA metro area. My current commute is about 20 miles or about 32km one way and that’s considered a short commute. I have had commutes of over 60 miles (100km) one way with some previous jobs. That’s why I want a vehicle with some size and comfort rather than something tiny and economical.
Wow Frank. Glad to hear you are ok. Be careful, though. Back and neck injuries resulting from car accidents can take up to a year to show up. I would recommend retaining a good personal injury lawyer because, at least according to my state traffic laws, a person making a left hand turn is entirely at fault in any resulting accident. Your car might have only been worth $1000, but your health and ability to make a living are worth much more.
Hi Vinny,
If I get to talking about lawyers too much I’ll have to put Adsense back on this site,
Wow is right Frank!
You make sure you get a proper check up after that! And I agree with Vinny on making a claim.
As to your replacement vehicle, I know the price of gas sucks (even more so if you live in Spain and totally off the scale in the UK), but personally, I would go for a van again. I never feel safe in a small car, but that’s just me I guess
Hi Zania,
I do miss having the big huge pickup truck I had a few years ago, a Dodge Ram with a high performance engine. But I don’t miss the fact that it would cost about $125 to fill it up with gasoline though.
I’m going to have to check around to see what’s available in the way of vehicles as well as financing for them. I was hoping the van, which was paid for, would last at least another year. It had just over 157K miles on it and I probably could have gotten 200K out of it.
First, I just checked the feed and found out about your accident. I’m glad to hear you had limited injury, given you were on a highway.It’s good you’re OK. Some guy ran a stop sign and totaled my mothers car last JULY and we still haven’t gotten all the legal stuff/new car resolved yet.
But when I was setting up BANS I noticed that some guys were actually selling whole cars! So maybe an ebay scan and a craigs scan are worth the time. I drive a small pick-up and I was going to buy a big one, but now I’ll probably buy a 4 door jeep (think it’s called a wrangler). But the mid-sized trucks can be amazing on gas. Unless you just need/prefer a van style hauler vehicle…
Hi Dave,
I’m probably going to be looking at another mini-van or perhaps a crossover or smaller SUV. It depends on what I can find at a good price.
Frank, glad you’re OK. Small world. I lived up the I-75 corridor for almost 15 years. Starting in Smyrna, then Marietta, Acworth until I finally settled in Cartersville. Continually moving out in the ‘burbs until I just had enough and decided to move to Nashville a couple of years ago. I made the commute daily to I-285/I-75. I miss Atlanta. I don’t miss the traffic.
I had a 1980 Toyota Tercel for 13 years. Had it all through school and beyond. Then I bought a 4-door Civic. Drove that car for 335K miles. I hated putting gas in a vehicle even when it was 89 cents. We were a one car family for a long while. We bought a Camry that now has 230K miles on it. We’ve had it for 10 years. We recently got rid of the Civic and bought a Sienna mini-van. It’s a 6-cylinder and gets OK mileage but it’s bitter filling it up. Get yourself a Camry or something similar. The one I have has air bags. Is considered safe. Is durable. The 4-cylinder version I have is pretty quick actually and gets good gas mileage. No way I would even consider anything over a 4-cylinder these days. These small cars can be very safe. It’s going to be tough getting people in America out of gas guzzling vehicles but you gotta start somewhere. $8/gallon in a couple of years might just do it despite the thinking that small cars are unsafe.
Hi Splork,
I also started out in Smyrna about 22 years ago and I’ve been moving east ever since. The traffic here never stops sucking.
I used to have small 4-cylinder cars up until about 15 years ago but the safety factor is big for me, even more so now. I’ll have to look into one of those ethanol stills if fuel costs go up much higher. The van that got wrecked got pretty good gas mileage, particularly considering its age.
geeez, that’s bad luck frank. I hope everything is allright with you.
Hi Dinheiro,
I’m OK. I just have a few bruises and some muscular soreness. Given the speed involved, probably somewhere around 45-50 mph (70-80 kph) it could have been much worse. Hopefully nothing serious is hidden or anything like that.
Glad to read that.
I am glad you are okay man!
I totalled my car last fall…. I had JUST put a new windshield on it after it had been cracked for 10 months… i finally broke down and bought a new windshield and totalled my car 3 days after… the windshield was fine, but not the car!
Hi LBB,
While I did just put two new tires on the van, luckily I decided to wait on some additional engine work it needed, a major tune-up and some other things. It would have been really annoying to have just dropped $500+ on it and then lose it.
BTW, I’ve got your “DoFollow Diver” in my rotating BlogRoll now. Nice job.
I had an almost similar incident but I was lucky I wasn’t driving as fast and my car’s ABS kicked in and stopped on time. It was a close call for me as the roads were icy at the time. I can still remember the expression in the face of the other driver.
Hi Xel,
The roads were dry in this case. The other driver either wasn’t paying attention or was a poor judge of speed and distance. The police and the wrecker guy say that there are at least 3 accidents a week at that intersection. They probably need to change the way the lights work at it to prevent more accidents.
Hope everything is fine on your end. Is the other driver a 40+ lady? Strange question, yea but all my close encounters with car accidents, for some reason are always with a 40+ something women. Don’t know why!
(not being sexist here but just stating facts)..
Hi Xel,
She was 33.
Do you think you can post a photo of the van? I am interested to see how it looks.
Sorry Komodo,
I didn’t get a picture of it. I would have if I had thought about it before I left the junkyard it was towed to. I thought about that on the way home.
It was a 1995 Mercury Villager that looked sort of like this
Imagine that van with the front smashed back to the front tires.
Hope you are healing from your car accident. You were so lucky! My husband was seriously injured when he was hit by a drunk driver and is still in a lot of pain. That was back in the early nineties. He is looking to get a new hip this year. His hip was crushed in the accident and was out of work for almost two years. Thankfully he got social security disability until he could be retrained to work a different job.
Things like this can change your whole life in an instant.
Hi Denise,
I’m thankful that I didn’t get seriously hurt in the accident, at least as far as I can tell at this point.
I really liked that van though in spite of it being an old, ugly, mini-van. It was ultra-reliable and was comfortable to drive. And, as it turned out, safe in an accident.
I hope you’re OK still.
Did you ever get a replacement car? If so, what did you get?
Hi Harley,
I went with a mini-van again, a 2005 Chrysler Town and Country Limited. I’m enjoying it so far and it has all the bells and whistles like a built-in DVD player and navigation system plus the Stow ‘n’ Go seats which are nice.
I decided to go with the mini-van because I like the cargo carrying and people carrying capacity. Plus, I just feel safer in a bigger vehicle.