Sunday, February 3, 2013

James Bond Status! An inside look at Elder Staheli's epic car accident!


I was driving on the highway, with the other three Elders in the car. We were headed from Williston, ND, to Newton for a Zone meeting. The windy roads were slick and it was snowing and blowing bad when I took a turn at 55 miles per hour. The car flew off the road, fell along the ravine, went through a fence, then slid downhill for 150 feet before coming to a stop. What could have been a bad accident had turned into a glorified sled ride!

A lot of other cars did the same thing at the same time. None of us were hurt. It was like we were shipwrecked, and I wanted to see the other dead cars down there with us. It was cool to come out of the crashed car wearing nothing but our suits. I felt like James Bond!


People came running from their cars, and calling out, “Holy ***” (A colorful explicative from the people of Williston.) “You guys are clear down there!” The people who had stopped wanted to help us, but none of their cars could touch us so we had to have a towing company. The towing truck guys said God was riding with us!

They blocked the roads, and I was sitting with a police officer for an hour in his car, filling out reports. He told me that semi-trucks and school busses full of kids had ended up in that field before under the same type of snowy conditions in previous years, and it takes all day to take care of getting those vehicles out of the ravine.

The car can still be driven, but not by me. I got a black dot, which means I lost my driving privilege. I don’t mind. You know I hate to drive anyway, so I’m happy just sitting back and letting someone else do the driving. It also means I got a new companion, an Elder I really like, who doesn’t have a black dot.

Now we’re just waiting on a repair report to be faxed to our car mission guy then the church insurance can kick in. We can drive while the parts to the “bomber” come. The paint got scratched up and the bumper cracked, but other than that it’s fine.




If we had canyons here, it'd be a different story. I guess we went off North Dakota version of a cliff. Ha ha! 




Thanks for the cake, Dad and Mom! Surprise! I had a “Happy birthday, Harry” too. I actually had Hagrid give me a cake. There was a guy I’d never seen before came to the door and gave me a cake. I was like, “You know my dad?” He’s like, I’m the pastry chef at Economart.” Oh, Ha Ha! Guess you wouldn’t have to know my dad then I said, "It’s my birthday" like what Bruce Wayne said to Rachel .

No comments:

Post a Comment