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'
e
by
Norman
L.
Shoaf
You
can avoid accidents! We explain how in this vital article.
T
HE LAST
t hi ng I saw
before the crash was a
moving orange blur in
the corner of my left eye
as 1 reached t he intersect ion.
My
last thought was: He
can't do that- he has to stop-1
have the green light!
Before 1 realized what was hap–
pening, my car slammed into the
side of the other car broadside.
lt All Happened So Fast
I didn't even have time to try to hit
the brakes. Tbe collision folded my
compact car.
November/ December 1984
My head hit the windshield as I
was thrown forward and then back
into my seat.
1
saw the glass shat–
ter, and then
1
saw nothing but
red as blood gushed from my
face.
Hitting the g lass opened a jag–
ged gash in the middle of my fore–
head and tore away part of my left
eyelid. T he eyelid required 15
stitches to clase and plastic surgery
to restare. A quar ter of an inch
lower and the glass would have
gouged my eye out. Dozens of tiny
bits of glass were imbedded in my
face and scalp.
1 don't know to this day what
happened to smash my left wrist.
The unusual break required the
surgical insertion of a metal pin to
hold the bones together. The pin
has since been removed, and
I
have near ly all the use of the
han
d .
For tunately, no one in the other
car was injured, though both cars
were irreparably damaged. As l
write now, a litt le more than four
months later, the damages and
med ica! bilis have already
amounted to more than $10,000,
and medica! visits, filling out forms
and answering investigators' ques–
tions have consumed a dispropor–
tionate amount of time.
Who would have thought? It was
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