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Pickup Crash

December 8th, 2002.  

I'm okay (a little bit of a sore neck for a few days). About 2:50 PM I was on the Moscow-Troy highway going east at the golf course. I was waiting for some oncoming traffic to go by so I could take a left. She skidded 121 feet but the ISP officer said she was probably still going 50 MPH when she hit. I was driving the pickup with Ry as my passenger. He has a sprained neck muscle (according to the ER physician) that is causing his right arm to feel weak and tingly. The driver of the other vehicle looked pretty bad to me. She was hyperventilating and her arms were about chest height with her hands sort of contracted and she was vigorously shaking all over. Her eyes were closed and she didn't show any response to people talking to her. The ambulance took her away on a stretcher. Ry went into ER about 6:00 PM when the pain started really kicking in. The doctor that treated him said she treated the other driver and that she is going to be fine.

The pickup was shoved about nine or ten feet with all wheels locked. The rear bumper of the pickup was folded up underneath the pickup and portions of it poked up through the bed. That was an almost new bumper too. I had received a new one after getting rear ended on I-405 a couple years ago. Ry's arm permanently caved in the dash board just above the jockey box. The rearview mirror was knocked off I don't know if this was from the impact or because one of us hit it as we bounced around inside the cab. The cup of pop (from McDonalds) was sprayed all through the interior. An ice chest in the back of the pickup got a hole punched in it and punched a hole into a milk jug that was inside the ice chest. The canopy was displaced about six inches to the rear. There was a flexible plastic mixing bowl in back (we had just gone to the range to test out some explosives) that was shattered. The latches to the door of the canopy tore through their settings as if someone had kicked their way out from the inside. The tin on the right side of the pickup is folded with the bumper. The end-gate doesn't close on the right side without some encouragement from my size 14 boots.

Both vehicles were considered totaled although the pickup still is drivable.

My calculations differ from what Ry recalls the ISP officer said.  My calculations indicate a crash speed of about 40 MPH.  Further more she was going about 60 MPH when she hit the brakes and started her skid.  I'll get a copy of the ISP crash report in a week or so.

Ry's version (including the first four pictures) follows:

I was riding shotgun in Joe's pickup; we were stopped to make a left hand turn and Joe says "please stop, please stop". I look in the mirror and I see a dodge neon smoking it's tires trying to stop. Then...

http://pix.ryjones.org/POR/Album.aspx?a=47

So a few hours later I went to ER, got some Hydrocordone and 600mg Ibuprofen, and got sent on my way. X rays were, as they say, negative; which is positive.

Note the canopy is pushed back. The subframe that holds the bumper on came through the bed of the pickup, and a number of mixing bowls were destroyed.

 

Ry overheard the ISP officers talking about the McNuggets on the floor.  It is suspected they contributed to the crash.

On the left the bumper is rotated a little more than 90 degrees from normal.

On the right it's about 120 degrees.

It's a little tough to see, but there were two 'things' that poked up through the bed from the bumper.  One in the lower left the other near the ice chest.

Close up of the ice chest and the piece that punctured it.  It also punctured a milk jug inside the chest.  It was nearly empty and it was quite surprising that the chest did not just bounce away.  The speed with which it came through the bed must have been quite high.

Ry was holding a paper cup half full of soda pop.  It was sprayed throughout the interior.  He also left a dent in the dash just above the vent.  The vent no longer rotates properly.

The car fared worse.

The airbag probably contributed to her escaping with only a couple chipped teeth.

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Last update: 12/23/2002