My Crap Ass Trip to Calgary

I had to make a trip into Calgary on Wednesday to pick up a ski team tent and organize our winter team expenses with Gord Glass, the Swix and Fischer rep. We were able to get our skis and team suits ordered up and get a screaming good deal on them. On the way from there I was in a car accident on McLeod Trail and (around) 120 Ave. For some miracle of nature I came out unscathed.
I was driving behind a Land Rover with a 40(ish) year old woman and her 10(ish) year old son in the back. In front of them was a truck pulling a flat deck trailer with a load of aluminum pipes. For some reason the pipes were caped on one end and the caps were facing downwind (at the back of the trailer). The wind must have caught a four of these pipes and flung them off the flatdeck. Both the driver in front of me and I saw it happen and slammed on our brakes to avoid a collision. When the woman slammed on her bakes the front end of her vehicle dropped down and acted as a ramp for the pipe to crash through her windshield, killing her instantly. The boy in the backseat suffered neck injuries and was not in good shape. The second pipe flew up over her vehicle and came straight at me only to land almost perpendicular to my car and roll under the front wheels where it flew up and smashed out the front grill of a Ford truck. Two others ricocheted off of the front of the Land Rover and bounced across to the other lane on the right punching a whole in the rear passenger door of a car beside me and the last one bouncing off in to the ditch across three lanes of traffic. There were also a couple cars behind the Ford that ended up in very mild fender benders due to the high speed reductions.

I have to say that was one of the scariest moments of my life and don't really think I will be over it for a long time to come. I just can't believe that I came through it without a scratch on myself or my vehicle for that matter. I think there is likely a small dent at least under the car but I haven't really taken the time to look. It drives fine , without any shimy or mis-alignments that I can see or feel. I was at the accident scene for almost and hour and a half before I was free to go. I gave them all of my information but have not heard anything back yet? I guess I'll just wait and see if I need to go back over for a hearing or something related to the idiot construction worker who improperly secured his load. That guy will have nightmares for the est of his life.

After that I got in to the car and got out of the city as fast as I could heading back out on the 22x the way I came in, to avoid all of the traffic. But, coming down the Field hill towards Golden some guy in front of me drove over a huge rock in the middle of the road and tore a hole in his gas tank belching gas all over the road. So....I stopped and drove him down to Field where he could call for a ride. A cleanup crew drove past me just before I dropped down into Golden, so they must have been alerted to the spill.

I got home at 8 and was never happier to get out of our car. I'm just happy to be alive through that one.