My parents and my brother just got back from a little drive. My brother just recieved his learners permit a couple weeks ago (he's 15 years old) About 45 min after they left, i got a phone call from my dad, saying they were in the ditch, and they'd be home shorlty. I knew how bad it was when i saw the car pull up the driveway and only 3 out of the four lights were working (both headlights, 1 fog) Since it was night and raining out i really couldnt tell otherwise. This is on a 2 lane county road, so there werent alot of other cars around. What happened was my inexperienced brother was driving, and an oncoming car swirved into his lane, (either purposly, or drunk, or just plain stupid). So my dad, sitting in the passenger seat, grabs the stearing wheel and steers the car out of harms way. the car is headed for the ditch on the right hand side, the car is skidding out of control , swirves over into the ditch on the left hand side, smokes a sign, and comes to a stop. they were able to drive the car out of the ditch and back to the house, where i checked out the damage. The bumper is smashed in like crazy, the hood is a little folded over in front, front left foglight is probably sitting somewhere in the engine compartment, front left headlight is broken, and the thermometer in teh overhead console reads 0. Thank god no one was hurt, and the airbag didnt deploy. It just really Ticks me off when somthing like this happens and the other A-hole doesnt even bother to stop and make sure everythigns ok. God i wish i could show that guy whats up. What a crappy thing to happen when you just get your permit.

 

I am glad to hear everybody is ok,and dont worry,that jerk will get his in the long run.

 

Glad everyone is ok. Your insurance might pay for it without raising your rates, and without a deductable.

 

I've got a story to tell similar to yours, Peter.

About a week ago, my stepbrother (26 yrs old) and his wife were driving home on a 4-lane highway at about 65 mph (speed limit is 65, too) when a car that must've been going at least 80 clips them on their rear and sends them spinning off the road, where they tumbled down into a ditch, flipping three or four times. Thankfully they were both wearing their seat belts and neither of them were seriously hurt, just banged up some, with some back pain. Needless to say, the car is now in the junk yard. And the guy never even stopped or slowed down to see what happened - just sped away.

The recent good news is that my stepbrother found out from CHP that a good samaritan chased down the guy who clipped my stepbro and got his license plate number, and also got a good look at his face. He says he would be willing to identify him in a line-up if need be. Also, it turns out the car that clipped them was a rental car that was only supposed to be driven by the man-who-was-driving-it's wife. Now that guy is claiming it was stolen and that that was when my stepbro was hit. Either way, hopefully this guy gets brought in and some justice is done. To be perfectly frank, by stepbro could probably get quite a bunch of compensation through a law suit, but I don't know if he's going to bother with that or not. Anyway, just thought I'd share that with you all. Peter, hopefully your brother won't be discouraged or scared away from driving. I know that can happen to people when they first learn and immediately are in an accident, especially one where they end up in a ditch.

Ryan

 

You can be a little scared to drive even if you have been driving for a while and get into an accident. I know I was when I smacked up the little car.

 

Sounds like the need to bring back the .45 caliber justice system. Some people are just ignorant, and the sad thing is only innocent people suffer for it. Then you get those who know what they did and it actually makes them laugh.

 

Sorry to hear about your Ranger, Peter, but the family is OK and that is what is important.

 

glad to hear everyone's ok. i know what u guys mean abt young drivers getting scared after an accident. my mom always let us drive down our country road before we had our permits. well i always did fine, but a while ago she let my sis drive, she got into the driveway and accidentally hit the wrong pedal, and smoked our garage pretty good. 1400 in damages just to the car. but she was so upset, shes had her permit now for 11 months, and hasnt been behind the wheel since that.

 

Oh yeah, by the way, this happend to our 98 dodge grand caravan, not the ranger, thats safely parked in our garage. The total estimated damages are 1500$. And an update on the lost foglight that i thougt was somewhere in the engine compartment, it fell back through its hole and is now dangling by the wires. The car is still driveable, so thats a good thing. I'm glad it didnt happen to the ranger, cause right now i'd be sitting on that road waiting for that **** to drive by again then i'd follow him, and call the police.

 

This happened to me in January, people have no idea how to drive on the snow around these parts. Because people approach stop signs like they do on dry pavement. So I ended up ditching my truck to miss this idiot and causing $500 dollars of damage to my truck. This moron didn't even stop. Next time I'll just run into them.. I don't like having to pay money because of other people's mistakes.

 

Well, she should not feel too bad. I was backing up in my garage trying to make sure my mirror did not take out a shelf and hit the wrong pedal and pushed a ladder through my wall. Luckily it went between the studs so just had to replace the dry wall. Since then I put a 4 landscape bricks (big ones) with a 2x4 to stop my tires. Live and learn is all we can do.

 

I posted some pics of the car after it hit the ditch, its really not that bad.
www.sounddomain.com/id/peter94

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