HORROR WEEKEND

The car wreck I will not publish (The Toowoomba Chronicle did publish a graphic shot of the wrecked car) but was located to the right of this photograph still in the dark.....this was when emergency services were clearing the area because of the power lines down everywhere..


On Friday night was working late at the hospital and at the end of my shift the lights went out and the huge complex emergency generator kicked in.....Wondered briefly what had caused the outage but was not overly concerned as have my own generator at home in case of an emergency.

Let myself out of the secure complex drove to my car and set off home and noticed the whole town was black and not a light anywhere.......Turned the corner on to the road that would take me home and spied movement on the road ahead......a car was wrapped around a power pole and the pole was at a dreadful precarious angle. The street has a nature strip down the middle and have a SUV drove up on to the nature strip as the ambulance was pulling up and caught in the headlights my niece, Rose standing a little away from the vehicle and in the dark and the sweep of my headlights made out pedestrians who had vacated a nearby church hall where attending a function. I started to turn on to the other side of the road and discovered power lines down and the Emergency Services had yet to secure the site. My niece lives on the opposite side of the road where the accident occurred and had rushed out when she heard the thump. Rose is a Registered Nurse and with disregard for the leaning power pole and the dangling power lines had wrenched open the car door to render aid should the accident victim warrant assistance. Rose checked the carotid artery and discovered no life. She declared his death as a district ambulance office arrived. She endeavored to leave the immediate area as the Emergency Services were securing the area reequiring everyone out and though for a horrible moment, but knew it was not possible because of what she had discovered in the car, that she had heard a sound raced back to the car...the radio had kicked in for a moment or two.
The victim was a thirty two year old man who I have known since a lad who lived in the same district as myself and my boys and boarded the same country school bus, attended the district Christmas Tree with Santa every year..

This is a real life tragedy. The victim by the wheel tracks did not brake and had accelerated into the power pole was only 150 yards from where he had started his journey. Friday was the anniversary of the day his uncle had shot himself when we had ridden the mountains with anguished hearts trying to locate him. He, the uncle, was located in a shallow cave. Friday night's victim's mother had driven her car into a tree to her death nine years ago on Christmas Eve..

I stood with one of the family who was required to ID the body with a sense of dejavu as had done this before, he and I standing about with a person dead before us waiting until forensics could complete their investigations. The power authority to declare the area safe so that the body could be cut from the vehicle did not happen until after 3 am in the morning. I stayed feeling a sense of helplessness talking with my niece who selflessly had jumped in that car to see if she could revive the driver. Not a good weekend.