Name: Kaleb Collier
From: Radford, Virginia
Votes: 0
My senior year of
high school, I had the unfortunate experience of having my first and
hopefully only car accident. I was at Radford University with
several other of my high school friends on a college tour also
visiting friends who were already students at the school. We were
staying overnight to gain the “full experience” of a student and
left the campus to venture out what life beyond campus was like.
A few of us
decided to leave campus and get food a few miles away. I was driving
at night, on a road I had never traveled before. Not knowing the
area I should have asked another person I was with to drive instead
of volunteering to drive. Taking this one step would have allowed
the night to end in a completely different way, and the months to
come to taken a different course as well. Several hours after
leaving campus, we were on a main road traveling back to campus that
had a posted speed of 55 miles per hour and I had to take a sharp
right turn. There were no warning signs to indicate a sharp turn or
to decrease speed going into the turn. I felt like my car might turn
over with the sharpness of the turn so I decided to straighten my
steering wheel. Fortunately no cars were in the lane ahead of me. My
car crossed several lanes of traffic that were empty, but my car went
over an embankment on the other side of the road and down into the
ditch getting stuck. Everyone in the car was uninjured, but the car
was not drivable. In the days ahead, I was without a car and ended
up having to get another car.
Not only did the
accident and the car being totaled caused an immediate financial
burden on my family, but it has had an impact on how I have driven
since then. Although it has only been a year since the accident, I
am still very cautious when I drive. I drive more slowly and I am
more aware of my surroundings. Although I was not texting or using
my cell phone when I had the accident, I do not use it still. I do
not play music in my car loud so I can hear what is going on.
The most
important lesson I feel I learned is to pay attention to what is
going on outside the car when driving. I think before I took that
for granted. I was concerned with what was going on inside the car
and things happened so quickly and I had little time to react. I did
not have enough experience yet to know how to react in time. I also
think I should not have been driving so quickly on a road at night I
was not familiar with. I should have had someone else drive instead.
Driving is something that takes a lot of practice and several months
is not enough practice. I still hear my mother say she still finds
out new things, like new signs in places she has never seen before,
and new laws that come out. So I guess like everything else,
learning takes place everyday.
