Upon returning from my friend’s place this evening, I ended up caught in a backup on I35E-N in Lewisville at the Corporate exit.  It was just before 1:00am and I had been flying up I35.  As I rounded the bend about 3/4 of a mile before the Corporate exit I saw a long line of brake lights ahead of me.  Thank goodness for SIPDE (and a healthy dose of paranoid driving habits), which gave me plenty of time to react (the Avalanche has good brakes, but it definitely doesn’t act like a car—something to remember before cutting in front of one—I left that gap there for a reason).

It took quite a while to make it up to the scene of the wreck, since the police had closed off all but one lane of I35 as well as the service road.  While in the backup I saw one ambulance screaming off heading South, towards Dallas.  However I really knew it was a bad one when I got to the front of the line.  Just as we had managed to form a single line, I noticed the CareFlight helicopter rocketing off the ground with alarming speed.  You know that the crap has really hit the fan when they load you on one of those.  A few seconds later I saw the reason why.  A pickup truck had been smashed to the point that the front end was nearly unrecognizable.  I didn’t see any other vehicle that appeared to be involved and from the damage it would appear that the truck hit the bridge support (there was a UHaul right in front of the truck, but it appeared to be undamaged).  It looks like the fire crew had to peel back the roof and door of the truck to get at the occupants.  The front end had been pushed so far back that the driver was left with only 8 to 12 inches of space and there was quite a bit of blood on the seat.

I hope this turns out to be some kind of bad luck (a real accident), but given the time of day and the location I fear that it will turn out to be speed and/or alcohol related (I35E-N is the main corridor for people returning to Lewisville and Denton from the clubs in Dallas).  That’s one of the reasons that I always have some trepidation about driving that road after midnight on a Friday or Saturday night.  I always try to practice situational awareness while driving, but I ratchet it up to a pretty paranoid level during this time.  One of the best things I ever did was to take the MSF class.  The lessons taught in that class have allowed me to be a better driver, which I hope will allow me to avoid such unfortunate events as I witnessed the results of this evening.

Update:  Damn, the first sentence of that last paragraphs sounds a bit harsh.  I don’t wish that sort of thing on anyone.  What I was trying to get at (but my addled brain prevented me from) was that I hate to see people hurt or killed by something that can be prevented, like drunk or reckless driving.