I was in a pickup truck when it lost control on black ice
and crashed into a ditch. I
remember going into a spin and thinking "this is it".
I don't scream or brace myself, I am not tense, I sit still and wait for whatever end is coming. There is violent shaking and dark objects fly around in the cab; then blackness and calm. Warm, wet coffee coats my
face and head. I am buried with luggage
and equipment in the back seat. My
elbow feels cool against the frozen ground through the shattered window. I hear someone calling my
name. He sounds panicked, so I
quickly answer “I’m here, but I can’t move.”
I wait an eternity in a few seconds. Someone moves the luggage and a light shines in from
above. There is blood everywhere, my
blood. I can feel part of my lip
hanging in my mouth. “Is that
blood?” I ask for some reason; I know it is, but it seems like much more
than from a cut lip. I struggle to undo my seatbelt and I stand up in the cab. The truck is on its side. I brush cubes of glass out of my hair. There is a man with a flashlight above me and our driver is already outside
shouting for me to climb out of the truck. I am disoriented, my neck hurts and I am bleeding. I can’t find a foothold to
climb out the passenger window.
The other passenger is somehow unhurt and still in the truck with me. He provides a foot
hold for me and I climb out of the truck.
I walk slowly up the bank in a daze and watch the
northern lights dance in the sky.
I’m supposed to take a photo for my daughter, but it's not going to
happen on this trip. I look back
at the pickup and notice my bag of PPE is still in the pickup truck box. Someone hands me the bag and I carry it
up onto the road.
Three cars have pulled over to help and someone tells me to get into a car with a woman named
Maria. A dog in the
car is sniffing my hair. Nobody has a first aid kit,
so I am given a brown-stained paper towel to use for my lip. I hope the brown stain is chocolate. We start the drive to Whitehorse General Hospital. It’s the longest 30 minutes of my life, and while Maria is
hurrying to get me to the hospital, I am worrying we’ll hit black ice and get
in another accident. I can feel my
cell phone in my pocket, but every time I think of my wife and daughter I feel
tears well up in my eyes, and I don’t make the call. I need time to get myself together.
It is daylight when we get to the hospital. Maria and I walk into the ER and they
ask for my Care Card. I hand
them my wallet and they tell me to head straight through. They clean me up, take X-rays of my
neck, and stitch my lip. I have been in the Yukon for 12 hours when
they discharge me from the hospital.
I rent a hotel room so I can have a shower and wash off
the blood and coffee. I don’t even
like coffee.
I finally call my wife. It is an emotional
call, but I keep it together.
There is an accident debriefing meeting at their office. They ask me if I received first aid treatment. I didn't. They asked if I felt I should have been taken to the hospital in an ambulance. Probably.
I catch a plane home that afternoon. My wife cries when she sees me at the airport.
I am home.
