My post-Christmas joy.
It all started with a phone call at 7am with a stranger saying that Frank had been in an accident, but he was ok. Then I heard my mom sobing "Oh No!! Oh No!!"
My dad got involved in a wreck on Dec. 26 on a bridge near my hometown.
That's a firefighter cutting on my dad's car.
Friday, December 26, 2008 9:53 PM CST
Nine vehicles involved in six accidents on Route 130 hill near Lake Charleston
By ROB STROUD, Staff Writer
rstroud@jg-tc.com
CHARLESTON -- Six different accidents involving nine vehicles occurred within five minutes Friday morning due to ice on Illinois Route 130 at the Embarras River hill.
Three people were hospitalized due to the accidents that occurred just after 7 a.m. adjacent to Lake Charleston, said Deputy Sean Lane of the Coles County Sheriff’s Department. Lane said he spoke to the three later at Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center and none of them had life-threatening injuries.
“It could have been a lot worse. Fortunately, it was not,” Lane said. The officer added he had never before responded to so many accidents in such a short period of time in the same area.
The injured drivers were Robert F. Seeley, 75, 18060 E. County Road 250N in Charleston, and Linda C. Louer, 51, and Sherry L. Kearns, 31, both of Greenup.
The various accidents knocked one vehicle onto the roof of another and caused a nearly head-on collision between two others.
Pat Goodwin, assistant chief of the Charleston Fire Department, said two ambulances from Greenup and two from Mattoon were called to the scene due to the large number of vehicles involved.
The Greenup and Mattoon paramedics set up a staging area at Lake Charleston where they could cover Charleston calls as needed until the city’s paramedics were freed up from the accident response, Goodwin said. Charleston paramedics needed to extricate one of the accident victims from a smashed vehicle, he said.
Goodwin said the roadway was initially so slick due to “black ice” that emergency response vehicles could not get traction there. He said road crews from the city of Charleston and the Illinois Department of Transportation had to spread salt and sand on the roadway to give emergency responders better access to the scene.
The last vehicle was towed from the scene at approximately 10 a.m. Traffic was flowing without interruption by then but was blocked for a time after the accident.
Tara D’Arcy of Westfield said she and other morning commuters on Route 130 were ultimately routed onto the Bypass Road near the lake so they could get around the accident scene with all the emergency response vehicles there.
I'm glad I was home with my family when it happened. I didn't get to talk to him til today about the accident. Before I could get to our local hospital he'd been transferred to anther one, and I had to drive back down to Alabama for work today. After work I called home, and found out about the damage. He received 7 broken ribs a head injury, and his foot was broken in 3 places. He said the doctors were going to release him maybe Monday. *sigh* My dad sounded well though when I talked to him for a couple minutes. I'm hoping he'll be doing better the next time I visit home.
I'm starting to really love hospitals with my family. This is the third time one or the other of my parents have been in one.
My dad got involved in a wreck on Dec. 26 on a bridge near my hometown.
That's a firefighter cutting on my dad's car.
Friday, December 26, 2008 9:53 PM CST
Nine vehicles involved in six accidents on Route 130 hill near Lake Charleston
By ROB STROUD, Staff Writer
rstroud@jg-tc.com
CHARLESTON -- Six different accidents involving nine vehicles occurred within five minutes Friday morning due to ice on Illinois Route 130 at the Embarras River hill.
Three people were hospitalized due to the accidents that occurred just after 7 a.m. adjacent to Lake Charleston, said Deputy Sean Lane of the Coles County Sheriff’s Department. Lane said he spoke to the three later at Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center and none of them had life-threatening injuries.
“It could have been a lot worse. Fortunately, it was not,” Lane said. The officer added he had never before responded to so many accidents in such a short period of time in the same area.
The injured drivers were Robert F. Seeley, 75, 18060 E. County Road 250N in Charleston, and Linda C. Louer, 51, and Sherry L. Kearns, 31, both of Greenup.
The various accidents knocked one vehicle onto the roof of another and caused a nearly head-on collision between two others.
Pat Goodwin, assistant chief of the Charleston Fire Department, said two ambulances from Greenup and two from Mattoon were called to the scene due to the large number of vehicles involved.
The Greenup and Mattoon paramedics set up a staging area at Lake Charleston where they could cover Charleston calls as needed until the city’s paramedics were freed up from the accident response, Goodwin said. Charleston paramedics needed to extricate one of the accident victims from a smashed vehicle, he said.
Goodwin said the roadway was initially so slick due to “black ice” that emergency response vehicles could not get traction there. He said road crews from the city of Charleston and the Illinois Department of Transportation had to spread salt and sand on the roadway to give emergency responders better access to the scene.
The last vehicle was towed from the scene at approximately 10 a.m. Traffic was flowing without interruption by then but was blocked for a time after the accident.
Tara D’Arcy of Westfield said she and other morning commuters on Route 130 were ultimately routed onto the Bypass Road near the lake so they could get around the accident scene with all the emergency response vehicles there.
I'm glad I was home with my family when it happened. I didn't get to talk to him til today about the accident. Before I could get to our local hospital he'd been transferred to anther one, and I had to drive back down to Alabama for work today. After work I called home, and found out about the damage. He received 7 broken ribs a head injury, and his foot was broken in 3 places. He said the doctors were going to release him maybe Monday. *sigh* My dad sounded well though when I talked to him for a couple minutes. I'm hoping he'll be doing better the next time I visit home.
I'm starting to really love hospitals with my family. This is the third time one or the other of my parents have been in one.