Friday, June 5, 2009

Crash at Woodstock North H.S.

At about 10:40AM today a northbound car on Raffel Road left the road just south of Woodstock North High School and traveled through grass and across a rock drainage area on its way to a bumpy landing on the median of the entrance driveway. I happened to drive by very shortly after it happened.
The car must have been traveling at a pretty high rate of speed to travel as far as it did (approximately 400 feet) before coming to a stop, facing roughly northwest on the median of the driveway. Tire marks on the curb and tire tracks in the grass and weeds clearly showed the path of the vehicle. (Click on the image to enlarge it; then click on the Back button on your browser to return to the story.)

After parking out of the way on Haydn St., I walked the two blocks back to the high school driveway entrance. As I arrived, a paramedic or fireman was carrying a small child in a car safety seat to the ambulance parked on the street. The child, who appeared to be about 12-15 months old. was awake and alert, and he was looking around, not crying and not looking particularly scared. He would have just had a wild ride, and his little spirit had to be asking, "Whoa, Mom. What was that all about???"

I was taking some pictures from the street, when I was confronted by a man wearing a safety vest. I could not tell from any uniform what his role was, but he ordered me not to take any pictures "of her", apparently referring to the driver of the car. I told him I couldn't even see the driver, but he continued to insist. He demanded my credentials, which I had failed to put in my pocket this morning. I told him I was on a public street, and I was not in the way. Then he ordered me up the street a certain distance. I asked him twice for his name, and both times he refused to identify himself. No doubt Chief Webster will be able to figure out who he is.

The car, a white SUV, was badly mangled on the front right. The hood also was damaged and the windshield was broken. I hope the driver was belted in tightly; if so, she would have had a wild ride but should have survived the ride. If she was unbuckled, she probably got banged around pretty badly.

Parents: check those child safety seats. Stop at the next safety inspection you see and ask a paramedic or police officer to inspect the installation of the car safety seat. About 70% of the child safety seats are improperly fastened. The child survived today because he stayed in his seat and the safety seat stayed fastened to the car seat.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

First of all, stop hanging around all of the schools.
Second of all, stop with the crusade against the fire department, its getting old. WE DONT NEED NARCISSIST GUS BEING THE PAPARAZZI OF WOODSTOCK.

Zane said...

Oh yes we do. We need people like Gus in the worst way. PAPARAZZI and all! Keep up the good work Gus.

Gus said...

Thanks, Ole Blinky.

I even phoned a tip into the Northwest Herald about this accident. You'd think they would have put something online about it.

Tomorrow's paper ought to have some information. Of course, there is no press release on the WPD website. There aren't that many bad accidents in Woodstock, but this was one of them.

There could be many guesses about the cause(s); excess speed, distraction, stuck accelerator, health factor (seizure?).

I hope the driver/mother is okay.

Anonymous said...

While one could debate the expectation of privacy when someone is in an auto accident, I would hope that you, Gus, would prefer that a public servant err on the side of caution in shielding others from capturing a glimpse of one of your worst days.

Fighting the cause of access to information is noble; acting as if there should be no limit or filter to what information should be disseminated…is quite the opposite.

Gus said...

I had no intention of taking a photo of a hurt woman and showing her face. I was at least 100' away. I walked right by the baby in the carseat and made no effort to snap its picture.

Yes, I understand about privacy. Now, a vehicle stopped on a median after it traveled 400' through grass, gravel, metal fence posts and a tree is a different picture.

Several years ago I was barred from taking a photo of a house fire. The fire was out; some of the fire trucks had already left; firemen were picking up hoses; I was across the street.

That's when I got serious about access. Thanks for your comment.