From: owner-jangle-poets-digest@smoe.org (jangle-poets-digest) To: jangle-poets-digest@smoe.org Subject: jangle-poets-digest V7 #4 Reply-To: jangle-poets@smoe.org Sender: owner-jangle-poets-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-jangle-poets-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk jangle-poets-digest Wednesday, February 2 2005 Volume 07 : Number 004 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [JP] Pete & Maura Kennedy OK after auto accident [Pmkennedy@aol.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2005 15:14:54 EST From: Pmkennedy@aol.com Subject: [JP] Pete & Maura Kennedy OK after auto accident Hi, all, Sorry for this generic email, but we just wanted to let you all know that: 1) We're both all right, and 2) Early yesterday morning, around midnight, Pete and I had a serious auto accident. We were driving home from a house concert in New Jersey late Sunday night/Monday morning. We were driving in the autos-only set of lanes on the northbound New Jersey turnpike, near Perth Amboy, heading for home. There weren't any other cars on the road -- a very quiet night. When all of a sudden, a car came speeding like mad up the same lane we were in (the middle). Pete saw it coming in the rear view (he was driving) and I heard it. It sounded like a train. Pete said, "Hold on, this guy is coming fast." He couldn't really change lanes, just grip the wheel and hope the guy got around us fast. The driver of the other car did one of those video game-like moves where he got right up behind us, jerked his steering wheel to the left to pass, and then jerked the wheel right again immediately after passing us to get back in our lane. Unfortunately, he hit us on the way back into our lane. We were going 65, and we think he was going somewhere between 100 and 110 mph. we went flying into the median strip and started somersaulting. We rolled at least once on top of the guard rail. I think we're alive today because our car has roll bars. If it didn't, the car would have probably been sliced in two and us with it. We were also both wearing our seat belts. The air bags deployed, and we couldn't see anything outside the car as we rolled across the median strip. We were in a kind of a spiraling tunnel, in black and white, and the airbags looked to us, in retrospect, as that fabled light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel. As we crashed and rolled, we kept expecting to cross into the truck lanes beyond the median and get hit by one of the big rigs. As the car was spinning, we kept thinking, "we're going to die now"...just kept waiting for the lights to go out. When the car came to a stop, we smelled the smoke from the airbags and thought the car was on fire. My door wouldn't open, and I tried to kick it open but we got out Pete's door, and we found that we were still in the median. Our car had come to a rest upright. The other car was also in the median, still upside down, with at least two trapped inside. Everyone in the other car had serious back injuries (there may have been a third, but we were dealing with our own EMTs, and in shock ourselves). In the end they told us that there were no fatalities, but that the other carload were hurting. They had to be cut out of the vehicle. I Don't have any idea why they were driving like they were. They had no reason to pass us in the manner that they did. I'm sure the hospital staff probably took blood tests. Our insurance finds us 0% at fault. I think we'll see a police report within 10 days -- it takes a while to get. We don't even know the other peoples' names. We spent the rest of the day in and out of the hospital, getting checked up, then renting a car and getting all our music gear out of the car and driving it over to Manhattan, then returning the car in Hoboken and taking the train back. We're pretty exhausted now, as you can imagine, but we're OK, and very happy to be alive, the two of us! Today, Tuesday, we're starting to ache from the "ride." It seems to all be muscle pain in our backs and necks, but no more than you'd feel after a good workout. Today is a day of rest for us. We came very close this time. They say the darkest hour is just before dawn. When the car came to a rest and we each realized that the other was alive and OK, we entered the dawn, and you can't imagine how happy we are to be here. We have traveled a half a million miles together by car since we started playing music together 11 years ago. We intend to go at least another half a million more! Love, Pete & Maura The Kennedys pmkennedy@aol.com www.KennedysMusic.com Check out the Kennedys' Official Home Page: http://www.KennedysMusic.com/ Fab photos, the Official tour diary, dashboard Buddha haiku, groovy merchandise...what more could you ask for? ------------------------------ End of jangle-poets-digest V7 #4 ********************************