And put the damned phone down. Nobody’s coming in time to save you.
Speaking of dumb ways to die, the Reluctant Paladin brings us a classic.
The driver stayed on the phone with her husband for a bit after the car hit the water and began to sink. The car had manual crank windows. Reports are that she was in a panic state. After she hung up with her husband, she then called 911 and spoke to an emergency services operator. All while the car is continuing to sink into the water while she’s freaking out.
What struck me about this story is that, even after losing control of the car and ending in the drink, the woman and her kid were unhurt and in no serious immediate danger of anything but getting wet. The accident didn’t kill them. The water didn’t kill them. Panic killed them. And maybe overdependence on a telephone.
God — how awful. How unnecessary. How dumb.
I also wonder why the 911 dispatcher couldn’t just tell her the obvious — roll down the windows, let some water come in, and swim out.
Of course, 911 staffers are oriented to “just wait and help will be there.” But it sounds as if everybody insanely mishandled what could have been no more than a scary (and presumably very cold & wet) situation.
Speaking of insanely mishandled, it’s nuts that newer cars (and even some not-so-new like my Xterra) are designed so that you literally cannot roll down the windows without power. Who the hell ever thought up that safety feature? I keep a Spyderco Assist I rescue knife in the car. It has both a window breaker and a seat-belt cutter. But I’m not sure I’d have the oomph to break the window, and groping around for a tool would surely make a panicky situation worse.
Door locks, too. Recently I had some battery problems & while I could open the front doors with a key, I couldn’t open the back doors to let the dogs out. Fortunately, I was home & in the garage — no emergency. And fortunately I didn’t have the dog barrier in place that day. So I just coaxed them into the front and let them out that way. But I though what if I lost door lock power in an accident or other dangerous situation?
Stupid, stupid, stupid.