Holiday Car Wreck
"It does make a difference..." Tim Collier (left) recounts a holiday accident to his Trainer, Ronnie Driskell
Tim Collier, Texas Utilities Pipeline
December 1999
Ronnie,
I just wanted to let you know that your first-aid training came in handy while I was on vacation over the Christmas holidays. A very bad accident happened in front of my wife and me. A lady in Suburban swerved to miss a truck that pulled out in front of her, and she flipped at least 8 times. My wife and I were the first on the scene, so I had her call 911 while I checked on the people in the vehicle. The passenger was cut and bruised, but otherwise okay.
The driver on the other hand was seriously injured. In fact, I thought she was dead when I got to her door. She had two massive cuts on her head that were bleeding really badly. She was slumped over and making gurgling sounds. Someone gave me a coat, so I put pressure on the head wounds, and lifted her head up to clear her airway. She immediately started breathing freely.
I asked a man who came up and asked if he could help to get in the back seat of the Suburban and hold her neck still, while I continued to hold pressure on the cuts. After about 5 minutes, the lady came to. She was very frightened and was trying to get out of the vehicle. I asked the son her name and he told me, so I started talking to her. I managed to calm her down. I had the man continue to hold her head while I held pressure on her head until the ambulance got there some 15 or 20 minutes later.
My wife called the hospital later to see how the lady was doing, and it turned out she had 2 broken vertebrae in her neck, 2 massive cuts on her head, her left hand, wrist and arm were broken and her right leg was injured, but not broken. The doctor told the lady he had never sown up cuts on someone's head that were that bad and the person was still alive. And if pressure wasn't applied to the cuts, she could have bled to death. The doctor also said that if we hadn't held her head and kept her still, she probably would have been paralyzed from the neck down.
The one thing I was thinking while I was running up to the Suburban was that I didn't have any rubber gloves. The strange thing about it is that I carry a first-aid kit in my truck, with gloves, breathing device, etc. I had just taken it out of my truck before we left because I was going to trade in my truck for a new one. But, I did assess the area as I was running up to the vehicle.
Ronnie, I have never seen so much blood in my life. I don't think anything can prepare you for an accident like that, but clearly your training made the difference in the way I handled it. You know, we take the training for granted, but I'm personally glad we do it. I now know from experience that the training you and the other safety reps do is very worthwhile. Keep up the good work... it really does make a difference."