Saturday, December 27, 2008

Why Big Trucks Shouldn't Drive Down Steep, Icy Roads


December 22 - Monday night.  We had just returned home from a family night of games at the church.  Mark & I had shoveled the walkway and I stayed out to throw some salt on the the front steps.  A pick up came down the the road past our home followed close behind by another larger truck with a 30' trailer.  The second truck was blowing his horn and was out of control on the steep, icy road.  I thought for sure he was going to tip and tumble into our kitchen but he managed to to stay upright and smacked right into the the huge power line to the south of our drive and jack-knifed to a stop.  There was a loud boom and then the transformer box exploded.  I thought  my life was over as I stood in the wet water waiting to be electrocuted - then just watching and wondering if the truck would blow up. Thankfully the end of this story is a happy one, except for the insurance company of the poor driver!  (The pole alone was over $3,000 not to mention the small army of workers who were there on call doing overtime. ouch.)





Lindsey, Jake & Brady watch from a safe distance behind the beehives.  
We were glad the bees were safe and sound, unharmed.




 The power went off right away and they worked to restore it from 9 pm to 5 am.  The phone and cable lines also went down and were repaired later the next day.  We were so fortunate that there was no gas involved in this accident and no one was hurt.

Another lucky thing is that the truck landed right were we have 
been parking our subruban for the past week 
with all of the extra family home.

Photos the morning after.  You can see the downed power lines. 
 Amazing how they could remove the pole 
and replace it in the exact spot.  
Whew.  What a night.

1 comment:

Scott Flinders said...

Wow! I assume that knocked your power out for awhile. Was everything OK?