Well, actually it was my car's.
I was waiting on Three Chopt Road merge ramp to get onto N Parham road on a beautiful sunny Saturday noon (around 1230pm).
Suddenly I had a big shock, I knew immediately someone hit my car from behind.
I parked my car right there on the road and got down to see what happened.
A 2002 Mercury Mountaineer had hit me from behind.
This is the same SUV that I've been talking about where Jill Wagner comes in the TV Ad.
Then when my eyes went to the rear bumper of my car, I noticed few minor damages. I had few scratches and a little chip.
The Mountaineer too didn't have much damage on its front. The damages were actually less than what I anticipated based on the shock I had.
Then I walked around and saw and realized that I only had a secondary impact.
What actually happened was a Honda Accord had come fast and hit the rear of the Mercury Mountaineer and the Mountaineer had reacted to it and hit my car.
The reason I believe that the Accord had come fast was because of the damage to the Accord. It was very bad.
The airbags were deployed, and the windshield had cracked because of that and engine hood of the car had crumpled. There is no way all that could have happened, in my opinion, unless the driver had been driving fast.
That driver was a guy around 30s.He had some sore scratches on his face, due to the impact of the airbag.
But the lady in the Mountaineer, she was injured the most. She had a strange feeling around her throat. She said that she felt like someone is squeezing her throat and the back of the throat felt like was pushing at the front.
The Accord guy called 911. 911 is the emergency number here in US. You can call that number for virtually any kind of emergency. Road accidents, Fire accidents, Medical emergency, robbery, theft, almost everything.
This is one of the things that I admire in this country. After calling 911 within 3 minutes we had a Fire truck at the spot. The next minute a rescue squad ambulance was at the spot. Then they all helped the lady to lay her on a stretcher and took her to the hospital of her choice in the ambulance. The cops were on the scene on the 7th minute.
Anyone remember the scene from Anniyan movie, where a guy was left to die on the streets of Chennai?
Even though many in India may not like what Iam going to say now, well... lets be honest, that's the truth.
Seeing such things, sometimes I wonder if the value of life in India, in many occasions, is less than the value of life here in America.
Whenever someone says India is becoming more westernized...I feel sad. Being westernized is not just copying their Friday nights and Saturday nights. It's not all about the way you dress or talk. In my opinion, there is nothing wrong in copying , but what you copy makes the difference. Instead of following good things, we only follow the not-so-necessary things. Or in other words, Page 3 kinda things.
There are so many good things that India can learn from the west and be westernized in that sense, not just Page 3 stuff.
Anyway, the cop helped all 3 of us to exchange our car/driver/insurance information. The lady's father had arrived at the scene by that time. The lady had earlier called her father.
I came home and reported the accident to my insurance company. I took my car to my dealer and Matt who is my dealer told that Monday he will give the contact details of a person who does touch-up work.
I hope I can get all the repair charges from the insurance company.
Anyway, now my Bimmer is not new any more and it's not perfect any more.
I will have to call the lady's family on Monday and check how she is doing.
I hope she is ok. Car's can be bought and sold.But life. Thank God. Hope she is not injured much and recovers fast.
8 comments:
Vimal - Very sorry to hear about the accident. So your cars' ass got kicked eh! Forunate that nothing happened to you or to the other drivers. I bet it would have been one experience to see all the emergency crew arrive when you are involved in the accident scene.
I can't agree more on the copying front...there are so many things India(ns) can copy from the west such as the emergency services. I have seen vehicles overtaking an ambulance in India. Not to give excuses - when there is a system in place with a growth in population - I guess it is easy to make everyone get into the system. However in India - there is HUGE population and it is not going to be easy to bring everyone to follow a new system - it sure will take a lot of time! So - maybe there will be one day when we can see such things in India as well...
I don't think it has anything to do with being rich, or more literate.
Strong administration, Yes.
I disagree.
India has doctors and hospitals and ambulance and firemen and police.
There is also an emergency number. I think its 101.
The big deal is ...
(1) How many people call(other than just watch the accident) that number to report an accident?
(2) Once the police/emergency center receive the call, how does the administration respond to that call?
You don't have to be rich or educated to make a 101 call.
All you need is a cell phone and know what number to dial.
And I believe that almost every Tom Dick and Harry has a cell phone in India.
guess more than money or education - its common sense that needs to be applied! however - money (in other words more facilities or being more richer) does count as well. Here is how...
* Now once the action of calling these emergency services is done...
* The emergency crew needs to act and act fast. Not sure how good this is done. Boils down to the system or administration.
* Now if the emergency crew does act - it boils down to whether sufficient medical attention can be provided. This largely depends on the facilities and the number of places with the sophisticated facilities...which directly depends on $$$. Cities do have short comings, but probably better equiped - however the Rural India definitely does not have the facilities and the reach is definitely not yet there!
...My 2 cents...
I agree totally on the copying front. More than a country being rich, I think the individual has to be educated. In the foreign countries though the adults seem to be drinking and enjoying there is also a sense of honesty and responsibility in them. They are very mature. If each person in our government offices did their work properly and utilised the funds properly I am sure India would be a much better place.
I still don't understand what education has to do with such situations. These are common sense, like VJ mentioned.
Calling 101 for emnergency is just an awareness/commonsense. One need not be educated to make this call.
Well maybe I expressed it wrong, by educated I meant an understanding that makes the person feel for the suffering and reach out a hand... In fact village people jump and react at such situations. But in India you must also understand that sympathy is most of the times misused and the people who offer it are cheated.
Rajesh,
You had a good point there about the village people. Totally agree with you on that.
I think in village, when someone gets hurt, almost the whole village gets together, and they pull some truck or lorry and bring the patient to the hospital. I've seen this in my own eyes in hospitals. They don't care about money also. Everybody pools the money and takes care of the situation. It's actually in cities that people just stand around and feel sympathetic failing to take any action (almost exactly like Anniyan movie scene).
I myself remember being in such a situation, in coimbatore city, when I was a kid and I feel ashamed of it now.
I guess people in village care more about saving a life in such situations.
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