Car Overboard

Sunday morning, just before 10:30 am. Ken and I are on our way to church. Two blocks away, we hear sirens approaching our area from several directions. A fire truck zooms past. I have that passing thought: I hope the church isn't on fire... But of course it won't be. It's always someone else's emergency.

Except this time. We round a corner to find several emergency vehicles converged on the church parking lot. There are two fire trucks, an ambulance, and a police cruiser. A handful of people are clustered together, looking at a hole in the wooden boards bordering the parking lot. All the emergency personnel are gathered around this hole.

On the other side of the wooden boards is a giant hole in the ground. A condo development has been hard at work excavating. We can't see how deep the hole is, but we assume it's enough to accomodate at least two layers of underground parking.

The firemen work together to rip the top sections of the damaged boards away from the rest of the wall. As the gap widens, the tail end of a car becomes visible, barely sticking up out of the hole. Rumour has it that an elderly couple and their grandchild, a baby, are in the car, moments away from sliding nose-down into the depths of the pit. The driver hit the gas instead of the brake while parking, and they blasted straight through the wooden hoarding.

Now, in a scene straight out of a Hollywood action movie, they are poised on the brink.

As more and more people arrived for church, the crowd grew. Yellow police tape was put up to around the scene. More rumours flew through the crowd. We all watched anxiously as the crews formulated solutions. I put my head down and prayed.

Finally we were called into the church to pray together.

Fortunately, all the occupants of the car were safely evacuated. They had bruises from hanging face-down in their seat belts, and the driver was understandably distraught, but it was as good an outcome as anyone could have hoped for.

By the time the service was complete, the Big Tow was there, winching the car up out of the hole.



The angle of the car in this shot is the same angle at which it was "parked" at the edge of the hole.



They gently lowered the car down until all four wheels were once again on horizontal ground.



The guy with the camera is from one of the local news shows.



I was pretty shaken up by the incident, even though I didn't know the people in the car. I found out later, from the evening news, that the hole was only as deep as the car was long. They weren't in any danger of sliding into an abyss, as we all assumed. That impression certainly added to the drama!

All's well that ends well. Thank God.