EPTMy Father's Harley Davidson Dyna/Super Glide
vs
Old Woman's Buick Crown Victoria
My Dad's Motorcycle Accident: Dumb Elderly Woman Almost Kills Him
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Old Woman's Buick Crown Victoria
My Dad's Motorcycle Accident: Dumb Elderly Woman Almost Kills Him
Ok so here is the blog that I promised, well sort of promised in the Micro Macro Tournament thread, giving people an update on myself and especially my father's condition after his accident. I'll give a detailed rundown of everything that happened as well, well as far as I can, no naming the old hag that hit my father and etc.
First a map of where it happened and a news story for some video/audio. Note: the news coverage is BS and doesn't do the story justice, remember that when watching it. I'll get in to detail later.
Map:
Google Map Link
![[image loading]](http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c39/stewker/huffinefalcon.jpg)
Up is north. OK so my father was eastbound on Huffine Lane traveling between Four Corners and Bozeman traveling at approximately 60 miles per hour or 100 kilometers per hour. Huffine lane is a 4 lane road with a center passing lane. 2 lanes going east and 2 lanes going west. The speed limit is 65mph. An elderly woman, 85 years of age, who was westbound in the center turn lane tried to turn left on to Falcon Lane and turned immediately in front of my father and his bike. It was the classic case, of which consists the vast majority of all motorcycle accidents, of the car/truck driver looking right through a motorcyclist and not seeing them.
This woman was sitting in the center turn lane, waiting to turn and for some goddamn fucking reason decides to make her turn right as my father, who is driving in his own lane within the speedlimit, obeying all the laws, is about to pass her.
My father's memory of what happened next is understandably very foggy, but according to what he can remember and from the many reports we have heard is that my father saved his own life, he laid his bike down immediately knowing there was no way he could avoid her. If he would of hit her straight on without laying the bike down, I shudder at the consequences. It takes a lot of courage to do what my father did and it saved his life. It is not instinctive human nature to lay down a bike that weighs over 660lbs traveling at 60mph. My father and his bike hit the passenger side of her car, a stereotypical Buick that all elderly people drive.
I'll cover the injuries and everything else below, but that sums up the accident. The bike was totaled. That dumb fuck of a woman was 120% at fault and should never of been behind the wheel of a vehicle. She is a danger to society and should never be allowed to drive again. 85 years old and I don't think she was a spry old thing... No she was not hurt in the slightest.
CBS Station Coverage:
http://www.kbzk.com/player/?video_id=3377
Immediately above is the local news coverage of the accident. Myself, my family and my father's many friends all have issues with the coverage and at least from our point of view it's utter lack of professionalism.
1. My father's injuries were extremely life threatening. You DO NOT fly someone 400 miles to the south immediately following an accident in a fixed wing aircraft at HUGE expense unless it is utterly life threatening. The flight crew does not make the family sign a release form saying that the patient is unstable and may die before they get to the hospital. You do not give a person 8 units of blood between the accident and arriving at the ICU. Doctor's do not use phrases like bleeding out, pulverized and etc. You just do not do that if not's life threatening. That night driving down to Salt Lake City (fucking memories kicking in writing this) was the scariest and most upsetting night of my life, I did not know if upon arriving in SLC that I would be seeing my father alive or dead.
2. The way they word their report it almost seems as if they are suggesting that my father was the one that caused the accident. This is absolutely false in every way, shape, or form.
3. The implying of alcohol being involved due to the accident involving a Harley motorcyclist is offensive at the least and outrageous. Whenever a motorcyclist, especially a Harley rider gets in an accident people seem to automatically assume there is alcohol involved. My father is NOT a heavy drinker and has never been so. Not since those times when we all maybe drank more than we should in our youth. But my father is 56, that was 30 years ago. This was confirmed at the Bozeman hospital where my dad was initially taken and by the officer at the scene who did not smell any alcohol (obviously) on my father. The news station didn't even get their facts right.
My Mom's and my experience:
Wednesday afternoon, July 7th about 4:30pm, I was sitting on my back deck drinking a beer. I had just announced on twitter that I had just finished rebuilding my computer and would be working on getting the tournament organized before the start of things on Friday/Saturday. I was out on my deck drinking a beer, enjoying the sun, before I locked myself in my room to get some tourney stuff done. It was while I was on the deck that my brother's girlfriend, a roommate, told me that my brother had called her to tell me (my phone was dead atm) that our dad had got in an accident. The rest is largely a whirlwind of events that would fill a book. Drama in the family, driving adventures in multiple trips between Salt Lake and Bozeman, many many overnight stays in a hospital sleeping in waiting rooms and a little fold out couch beside my father in the orthopedic care unit, driving in salt lake city which is world's different from small town bozeman, and etc.
But to sum it up, from my house I went immediately to the hospital where it was a mad house around my dad, my mom and Istayed there until the flight crew arrived to take him to salt lake. After that we went home, packed, and hauled ass on the 7-8 hour drive to salt lake, driving through the night. We ended up staying in Salt Lake for almost 3 weeks, my mom staying the entire time and me making drives back to Bozeman to take care of my dad's construction business needs before immediately driving back down. I don't think we got much sleep during that period... Between worrying about my dad, helping out nurses whenever we could due to his constant pain he was in, and driving back and forth 400 miles. It's not a period of my life, or I think any of our immediate family's that we are going to miss.
Injuries/Surgeries:
![[image loading]](http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c39/stewker/Dad_Pelvis_TibFib2.jpg)
I don't know the technical terms but I'll lay it out in layman's terms. His right femur punched up and through the hip socket, shattering the socket. This caused the front of the pelvis where it meets at the bottom front to detach and separate by a full two inches. He also detached the left side of his pelvis from his spine, that side of his pelvis was jammed up past where it was connected to the spine by several inches. In addition he also sustained several other fractures within the pelvis, many that were/are serious due to the way they broke and the way they have to heal, to heal successfully. Finally, at the time of the accident the multiple breaks of the pelvis is what lead to his large amount of internal bleeding. Or at the least was the major contributor.
In total for his pelvis it took 2 plates, approximately 23 screws, and 3 surgeries to put everything back together.
He shattered his left leg into 11 different pieces. The fibula was broken into 3 pieces and the Tibia broke into 8. He has rods going down the center of each, the Tibia and Fibula, with the broken bones largely skewered onto the rods and/or packed around it as best as the surgeons could do. He has 4 screws in his leg holding the Tibia rod in place. Two in his ankle, one through the front of the ankle and one from the side. Two below his knee also from the front and the side. He will likely have to another round of surgery in the next month, after 2 surgeries already on his leg, depending on how it heals for bone grafts due to the severity of the break.
He fractured 5 vertebra in his spine. Several in the lower spine and a couple up higher. This was originally going to require a back brace to be worn for several months but just yesterday we got more xrays done, this is after we got back from Salt Lake, and they say here that the back brace isn't needed so wohoo! In Salt Lake though they said due to where they thought the fractures/breaks where that he was lucky to alive and/or not paralyzed.
The list goes on... He also fractured 8 ribs.
He also ruptured his bladder, nearly tore it in two due to the impact and the way he hit. This lead to a lot of worries of infection spreading due to urine largely leaking into his insides, but guess some higher power was looking out for him as that never happened. That took two surgeries to put back together but thankfully that seems to be healing well, actually he should be getting that taken out(the catheter) today or tomorrow. Thank god the urologist and his horror stories of my father possibly becoming incontinent turned out not to come about. My dad is a extremely proud and independent guy, that would of killed him.
Now amazingly and this is due to him laying the bike down and largely hitting the vehicle legs first, that he had no life threatening damage to his torso, arms or head. Thank god. He did sustain a large cut above his left eyebrow which took 8 stables to close, but thankfully that is largely it besides a huge amount of bruising, road rash and the already mentioned vertebra and ribs. No major organ damage or head trauma. The man was wearing his helmet, even though it did fly off his head at some point it certainly helped by the looks of the helmet afterwards.
Recovery:
After 2-3 stressful weeks in Salt Lake City at the University of Utah Medical Center, he is finally back in Bozeman staying in a Nursing/Rehab Center. He is none weight bearing in each leg due to the right pelvis/hip and the left leg. It will likely be 3-4 weeks still before he can even think about getting on crotches and/or using a walker to get around to do PT. At the moment he is bed bound and what is known as "Max Assist" from bed to wheelchair. The chair is even hard at this point due to him being bed-ridden for 3 weeks. Your body has to readjust to fighting against gravity, even sitting.
He has a special chair that reclines flat, actually its pretty cool lol, which really helps out. Especially due to his pelvis injury and lower back injuries and the pressure sitting up right puts on those bones and joints he isn't supposed to sit up right for extended periods of time. Basically a maximum of 30% for extended periods and only up to 90% for a few minutes at a time.
So yeah, this is the part that takes time, the rehab and recovery. 3+ weeks to get on crotches and then looking forward to months of intense rehab and largely just waiting for things to heal.
My prognosis for the future:
My dad is an active guy, he hikes, fishes, skis, hunts (we live in Montana, it's what people do), and I know he is looking forward to getting better and he will. He's a determined, hard headed guy. That's just the kind of person my dad is, and I wouldn't change it for the world. :D
EDIT: Oh yeah, he also lacerated his spleen. Forgot that one. >.<
![[image loading]](http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:nTPVxRmt07eD7M:http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e146/CaPtinShEiLa/get_well_soon.jpg&t=1)
