Tuesday Entry No. 2: The Accident

DIARY

Sometimes, working in downtown Chicago with over a million other people, all of us tight like sardines in a couple square miles, I get to see some drama.

Yesterday, as I walked to the L from work, I saw no less than three helicopters hovering above the buildings over the Magnificient Mile. As I crossed the Michigan Avenue bridge, I saw a cluster of three fire trucks and an ambulance tight at the corner of Michigan and Wacker Drive. I wasn't in a hurry, so I stopped to look out of morbid curiousity. A crowd of twenty or thirty onlookers watched as literally a dozen firefighters pushed a car from its side back onto its wheels. By "on its side" I mean that the car was perfectly balanced upon the driver side doors upon the raised median.

I was very curious as to how it could have gotten into that ridiculous position without having been lowered there by a crane, so I started asking around. An eyewitness finally confirmed that the driver had attempted to pass another car on the left, hadn't seen the median, and struck it at such an angle that his car had literally slid up and on to its side before the friction of two doors and a side-view mirror (that no longer existed) against the concrete stopped the vehicle. He added that the car might have been going a bit fast. Since the vehicle evidenly flipped on its side by striking an eight-inch raised median, this seemed likely to me.

In the last twist, the driver was fine. He crawled out without a scratch, and was trying to fetch his briefcase from the back seat when the fire department arrived on the scene.