Thank you, fellow Atlanta motorists, for not running over my son and me while we were stranded out on the interstate. Although, I must add, some of you weren’t trying real hard to avoid us.
The ordeal on a long I-85 overpass was probably the most terrified I’ve been since the time I stood in a prison gymnasium wearing a pair of boxing gloves. But that’s another story.
I was what transportation safety folks call an “unintended pedestrian.” Worse, so was Michael, my then 14-year-old son. To think I put him in that precarious situation only made it worse.
I thought of this episode the other day while researching a story about pedestrians who are killed on interstates. It was prompted by the death of a Dunwoody woman who was struck multiple times after refusing the offer of a ride from police wandering onto I-285.
My scare took place early on a gray Saturday morning a year ago when Michael and I were headed to a wrestling tournament. Being someone who’s usually running behind, I was heartened to see, upon entering I-85 south at North Druid Hills Road, that the interstate was clear.
But as I basked in the unfamiliar joy of promptness, my Honda Odyssey sputtered and then died. Having ridden a couple blowouts to the shoulder in the past, I was not overly perturbed. Instead, I wondered whether my newly purchased, previously owned vehicle was not the steal I thought it was.
Then, I glanced at the gas gauge. Doh! Out of gas. That’s what you get for hurrying.
The relief of avoiding a $4,000 transmission repair was soon replaced by panic. We’re going to be late! The wrestling coach won’t be happy with my son, a lowly freshman just trying to make an impression.
I called my wife. She could bring the gas can from the shed. No answer. It was 7:15 a.m. I called again. And again.
Then I made my next mistake.
Get out of the vehicle, I told my son. A van on the shoulder of a long, fast overpass is a sitting duck. It’s what I always did when I had a flat tire or other road emergency— get out, address the problem, call everyone back from the safety of the shoulder’s grassy area to say all was well, and be on my way. (I later learned that, in most emergencies, you should stay belted after pulling to the shoulder. And call 511 for help.)
This time there was no grassy median and the shoulder felt as narrow as a sidewalk, maybe leaving a couple feet on either side of the van. On one side, a long, low, vertigo-inducing retaining wall was the only thing between us and a 40-foot drop to the cement below. On the other side was instant death just an arm’s reach away as 6,000-lb. behemoths rumbled by leaving menacing blasts of breeze.
On the positive side, it was early, so the highway wasn’t packed. But that, too, was a negative. Cars were free to go as fast as they might, and those going 75 mph were dawdling.
The sense of helplessness and utter exposure was complete. It was a simple problem; I just needed gas. But there was no easy solution, no exit was nearby and, I figured, the van at least provided an obstacle to keep cars from drifting too far to the side.
Oddly, I never thought to call a H.E.R.O. unit, the state transportation emergency response teams in yellow trucks that have a well-known insurance company’s logo emblazoned on their sides.
The units were deployed in 1995 because Atlanta had a rate of pedestrians killed on interstates twice the national average. They attend to over 100,000 vehicles a year on metro highways, either because of accidents or car problems, usually flat tires or knuckleheads running out of gas.
Michael Roberson, who manages the units, said car problems outnumber accidents. And, obviously, there’s an untold number of motorists the state doesn’t know about because they never called 511. (P.S., the service is free and the average wait is 15 minutes.)
Anyways, we had been there 45 minutes, easy. A car pulled up maybe 50 yards behind me. A Good Samaritan? No, just some dude adjusting a wiper blade. And then he moved on, without glancing over at us. Out here, you’re just highway flotsam.
Finally, I reached my wife, who brought us the five-gallon can. I carried the plastic container to the side of the van, which was perhaps 24 inches from the nearest lane of traffic. I nervously hoisted its 30 pounds, my butt edging ever closer to the lane. Whoosh! A car went by in the middle lane. WHOOSH! Another blazed by, maybe three feet removed, not bothering to switch lanes. And then another.
The gas can was heavy and unwieldy. Worse, it was one of those new “safety” spout containers, one that easily could have gotten me killed. The new government-mandated devices have no vent. Instead, the spring-loaded nozzle can only open and pour when a plastic nub on the side is pushed down with the pressure of the 30-pound container being upended.
Trust me, it ain’t easy. It’s one thing to straddle a lawn mower and line up the contraption to allow the slow release of gasoline. It’s another to hoist that sucker shoulder level, line up the nozzle and have it flow into the vehicle while cars — and your certain death — speed by two steps away.
I worried that the can’s weight would send me stumbling out into traffic. So I tried leaning back against the van, holding the increasingly heavy container with outstretched arms, hoping I’d remain on the shoulder. The. Gas. Poured. Excruciatingly. Slowly.
Meanwhile, my son and wife stood some 50 yards away, waving their arms beseeching cars to move over. Many did. A surprising number didn’t. The law mandates that drivers pull over or slow down when emergency lights are flashing. But that’s for cops, ambulances and the like. Not for some mope out there trying in his stupid way not to get killed.
Atlanta drivers are famously distracted. They can be eating, drinking, spilling, conversing, texting, dialing, grooming, changing channels or yelling at their noisy kids. I hope that was it, distracted that is. Or maybe a good proportion of drivers are just unknowing. You know, thick — like me.
Be careful out there, folks. And pull over or slow down when you see some poor wretch on the shoulder.
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