The Triage Of Life

When things go south

A gruesome and honest account of something I witnessed.

Warning it is morbid because I wrote out of my own experience.

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We were driving along a dark road at about half-past seven on a Friday night. The wind had a chill to it, the seasons influence, as it passed over from Autumn.

My family and I were traveling at a safe speed for the road when a car came up our (As my Dad would call it) tush. We moved aside as the car went zooming past us, way over the speed limit, it looked like quiet an expensive car, painted Ferrari red and leaving stripped red taillights flashing arogantly us before dissapearing. I saw that we could only just see to the top of the slight hill we were climbing up, it was a blind rise and he was overtaking us.

"That guy's an idiot!", I said "He's overtaking us on a hill and he's going too fast, he's going to go splat!". And even though my comment had been me scolding an imbecil, I instantly regretted what I had said once we had reached the top of the hill.

Red, white, red, white, red, white.

"What the?" My dad had said seeing these different coloured lights spinning, not immediately realising what had happened. From his tone of voice I looked around his head and the headlights of a car in the opposite lane in the distance coming towards our direction light up the smoke comin from the engine of that same red car with the stripped red taillights.

"Daddy put your hazards on!" I had demanded. Yet he didn't do it, not yet realising what situation the red car had put itself and pulled someone else into.

"Daddy the other cars won't know there was an accident, put your hazards on." I had tried to coax him. It work, a second passed before I deemed our car was going slow enough and jumped out running towards the silver car that had spun out of its lane, across our lane and onto our side of the road.

It seemed as if my whole family had thought that way as we had forgotten to put the handbrake down, our car rolled forward very slowly before gently bumping into the other car. Both my parents and I had tried to slow the car down but we hadn't had much effect but luckily it was a small bump.

"Call an ambulance!" I had yelled to my parents. I left my parents to fix the car situation as I ran around the silver car to assess when I could start.

The accident had happened only seconds ago.

The windows were white whether at first from airbags of the shattered glass I couldn't tell, I had tried opening the doors, futile, but it hadn't even occurred to me that the doors would have been locked, as if I could have just walked up to the twisted metal and glass carcus and rip open the door. Pretty stupid huh?

Some other men had now joined me having also seen the crash from their own car. They had started to speak about how fast the other car was going but I interrupted. I told them that right now that nobody must take blame (something that my parents always told me, if you are ever in an accident never admit that it was your fault, even if it is as it is safer legally to let it be handled by your lawyers) I told them we need to focus on getting the car open and dealing with the injured.

The accident had happened thirty seconds ago.

By now a small crowd of about five people (and slowly getting bigger) were standing around the accident site looking hopeless. I have started to get people to clear the road of debris and set about getting them organised as the doors of the car were warped and locked, there was no chance in hell I was getting in there until somebody woke up and unlocked the door from the inside.

"I want someone to go both sides and warn people coming that there has been an accident, I don't want another person speeding through here!" I had bitterly comanded and people started to do what I told them to do. I hadn't even thought of it then but it must have looked strange, all these people listening to a teenage girl barely past the age of eighteen but thats the way instincts work in a survival situation.

Nobody in the car was awake yet and the doors were stilled locked, I was knocking on the doors and trying to get someone to answer me, slowly the moaning started but it was a bit of a muffled chorus. The driver was trying to talk as he was coming to and the most responsive so far, he was not conscious enough to comprehend anything yet and I was struggling to get any help from him.

Some men came and stood next to me, grabbed the windshield and started pulling, I started saying some words on encouragement to them as the glass curled off and the wails inside drifted out. I stood in front of the car and now with the windshield gone the catastrophe inside was revealed.

The accident had happened only two minutes ago.

The girl in the passenger had her head on the dashboard with the airbag inflated around her head and at that second I knew she was already dead. Everybody else in the car was slowly moving and groaning but she was completely still.

Then the woman in the back lifted up her her head and her dreadlocks moved away to uncover the huge gash on her head. It looked like something out a horror movie and that was when I noticed that there were kids in the car and my heart kicked onto overdrive.

My calf muscles were going into spasm, it pulled tight when it flexed and then sprung lose before pulling tight again, from the amount of adrenaline pumping through me that was not being used and I was feeling frustrated and helpless from not being able to do anything.

By now almost everybody (There were about twenty people now and cars were driving slowly over the decorative debris that was abundant on the road) was on their cellphones trying to contact an ambulance.

The accident had happened only three minutes ago.

All of a sudden my sister had called me, I turned towards her voice which was coming from one of the back doors, it was open and a child came walking out, he was obviously is shock as he came to sit where I pointed, a man came walking out of the car was well and he came to sit.

I quickly told people to bring any blankets and jerseys that they could but I had to also explain why (When a person is in shock their temperature drops and you have to put something warm over them. I then shouted for someone to drive their car over and turn their lights on so that I could better see what I was doing.

Almost instantly lights rolled in and I set to work and tried to get the little boy to lay in the recovery position (On your side with your one hand under your head and one leg bent at the knee), the boy couldn't go into the recovery position as both of his sides were too sore.

This was when I realised another big limitation, I had no First aid kit, I had no gloves and had open wounds, which meant I couldn't sort out his wounds. It was the same for the man who I tried to focus by asking him to keep calm the others that would come out, except they didn't.