What Was That?

We went to Kissimmee to pick up our mail and run some errands. I'm still confused about where we are most of the time, but we were sitting at a light when the F250 lurched forward a bit. My immediate response was "what was that?" Mark's initial thought was that something had gone wrong with the truck's gears. The truck seemed to be fine. My next thought was "Did someone rear end us?" Yes, I think they did.

Someone rear-ending an F250 enough to move it a few feet probably hit it pretty hard. But because it's a bit like riding in a tank, the  "what was that?" had no exclamation points or anything like that. It was the same tone of voice you'd use if you were trying to figure out if you were being annoyed by a gnat or a mosquito. We looked behind us and it did appear that there was a white Toyota that most likely hit us. I was going to jump out and investigate but Mark said not to get out where we were - too many lanes of traffic and the light wouldn't be red much longer. We would drive to a service station where we could pull over safely. We weren't especially worried about any damage because we have a tow bar on the back of the truck. Anything that hits us, actually hits the tow bar. Toyota vrs. F250? Pretty easy to figure out who wins that one.

We were on our way to the next intersection where we could pull in to a service station. The Toyota seemed to be following us and we indicated to move to the right so we could turn in to the service station. We thought the woman in the Toyota who'd hit us would be following us over but instead, she accelerated into the car that had been in front of us. We were shocked. Stunned. We stopped. People all around were stopping to help. She'd rear ended us, and now she'd rear ended someone else. Most of the people who stopped had seen her hit us and plow into the back of the other car. I'm not sure whether she had a stroke or some other event that caused her to be disoriented, but clearly she was. Mark and the men in the other car she hit helped her turn the engine off, got someone to call the police and an ambulance. Her head was bleeding and she was completely disoriented. They found a towel to hold on her head to try to slow the bleeding down while we waited for emergency response. Because we were involved (we were the first vehicle she hit) as well as witnesses to the second and far more serious crash, we ended up waiting for the sheriff and then the highway patrol. Poor dear - she was probably close to 90. She probably shouldn't be driving at all and she was probably lucky she didn't kill herself or someone else this time. I do know that if we'd been in the PT Cruiser instead of the F250, we'd probably have been hurt and the car would have been totaled.

As for the people in the other car she hit, the driver told us that he was driving his friend home from the ER when the accident happened and his friend had to be taken back to the ER. He thought he was okay but thought maybe he should go to the hospital to get checked out because as a single dad, he couldn't afford to miss work. And I'm not sure what happened to the lady in the Toyota. By the time the police got there she was able to talk coherently. She said she couldn't find the brake when she ran into the second car. That really doesn't explain how she managed to run into us. But it's not mine to worry about since we weren't harmed in any way.

It made for a relatively exciting day but not really the type of excitement we like. We're just thankful that the people involved are most likely going to be fine. And we walked away with a little white paint on our tow ball.