A car crash last night

[thestory]

Unfortunately this isn't exactly happy news.

I will start at the part where I was driving home yesterday. Me and my friend were on our way back from school talking as we usually do when I noticed the car in front of me suddenly stopped on the freeway. I mean stopped. No breaking, no slowing. It happened so fast I din't realize it was a crash till I skidded my car to a halt to avoid hitting them or the person behind me. We had all been in the fast lane so we ended up along the side divider in the mountain pass with the rest of traffic beeping and swerving around everyone. We were trapped in.
One of the people involved in the accident was already out and walking back towards us looking shocked. I told my friend to stay put and call 911 when I noticed a leg hanging out the other cars window. I got out and asked the guy who looked okay if he would be alright. The poor fella was just about in tears, not knowing if the other driver was okay.
Thats when I took initiative to go open the door and check on the man who had clearly flown into the back of the car. I was expecting anything with the car's back end tore like it was...the other cars front gone and spun completely around...and with the driver in the back with his leg out the window I wouldn't have been surprised if I had seen something much worse than what was there.
The guy was sprawled in the back clearly disoriented and with blood pouring down the side of his face. He had knocked himself a good hole in the side of his head. I told him he had been in an accident and asked if he was okay.
I asked this twice with no response. He had been knocked pretty hard. Thats when I said someone needed to hurry up and make that call because he had a head injury.
Luckily people were already on their phones trying to get through. So I went back to check on his head to find two other guys pulling him from the car onto his feet. This was irritating because YOU DON'T PUT PEOPLE WITH SEVERE CONCUSSIONS ON THEIR FEET! He was stumbling around and nearly fell again. Worst case scenario I could imagine was the poor confused guy stumbling into traffic. They placed him on the side railing to sit. He started talking again and was given a shirt to hold against his head.
Sadly the guy was hurt pretty bad and was having a hard time staying awake. He couldn't even hold the shirt against his head because his motor skills had gone to ->-bleeped-<-.
Everyone else seemed to blow this off and were too squeamish to hold it for him so I walked up and did it for the guy. Everyone seemed to take this as an excuse to back off and leave me holding the tottering guy on the railing while pressing a shirt to his head. I had to ask several times to have someone help be hold him or sit  him on the ground. Finally someone helped me get him sitting up against the railing instead of on it.
At that point I didn't mind them backing off. It was much easier just to talk to the guy and keep him awake while everyone was doing whatever.
He may have been confused and not even able to remember his age when he was asked by the EMT later, but he gave me his name and asked me for mine with gratitude. It was an interesting feeling. I was grateful in general that the guy was going to be fine. Once they had a brace on him and his head wrapped I felt better.

Sorry if I sound bitter at a couple of people at the accident. There was a very nice lady who came and keeled by the guy for a little while to comfort him while another man got him a sweater (the guy in the accident had no shirt on or shoes. The shoes may have actually flown off.). But as for the rest if you aren't doing anything to help please just don't stand and be in the way. It does get frustrating when you stare and don't help.

[V M]

Know the feeling. I applaud you for taking intelligent action 

Glad your okay 

[thestory]

Thanks. I am glad everyone was okay too. It could have been much more severe. I was actually relieved when I got a look at the guy, and the blood coagulated rather fast after pressing on the wound.
I just hope the guy only has a concussion and was rattled rather than a brain injury. He couldn't remember much at the time.

[Janet_Girl]

They should never, never, never should have moved him.  If he had a neck fracture it could   A) paralyzed him forever,  B) killed him.

I hope he is OK.  And that you have calmed down.


Janet

[thestory]

They should never, never, never should have moved him.  If he had a neck fracture it could   A) paralyzed him forever,  B) killed him.

Agreed. That is one of the reasons I was annoyed at some of the people there, and felt much better when he finally got the neck brace. You never know really whats wrong with a person till they get properly checked.

[Julie Marie]

You done good!  A lot of people would have walked away.  You have nothing to apologize for.  If I'm ever in an accident I hope there's someone like you there for me. 

Julie

[Deanna_Renee]

Kamren, the guy is probably very lucky that you were there, you may well have saved his life. I can relate to your feelings about the others who dragged him out of the car and just stood around being in the way.

I echo Julie Marie's sentiment that I would hope for someone like you if ever I was in an accident. I had been rear-ended once by a young lady who didn't see me stopped at a light and hit me doing (the police estimated) 35-40mph. I was fine, but her car was totaled and she wasn't wearing seat belt and had a laceration on her head. I ran to a gas station about a hundred yards away to have them call 911 and went back to check on her. I knew not to move her or touch her unless very necessary. She ended up with a concussion, dislocated jaw, 2 fractured ribs, multiple lacerations and bruises.

Life can change in a blink of an eye and often cannot be avoided. Stay safe everyone.

Deanna

[Alyssa M.]

Way to go. I once was driving over a high pass on a major highway when the cars in front of me swerved away and I suddenly saw another car facing my direction -- a guy driving alone had fallen asleep, drifted across a lane, and spun around when he hit the Jersey barriers. Somehow I and everyone else managed to avoid him, but his car was probably a total loss. My friend told me to stop and we talked to the driver (who was obviously in shock, but apparently uninjured) until an ambulence came. I never quite understood why my friend thought that was important until I wrecked a car myself and, addled by shock, nearly walked into traffic.

It's too bad there are so many clueless people. Thank goodness there are a few ones like you and my friend and the police officer who responded to my accident who have a clue.

[Janet_Girl]

If you have any kind of first aid training and you don't stop, it is against the law.  It is call the Good Samaritan Law.  But of course that is A) if you are found out to be present at the scene and B) you refused to render aid.  Of course you are only relived of that duty when someone of a medical profession says they will take over.


Janet

[Alyssa M.]

Janet, I think you might have been watching too much Seinfeld. Good Samaritan laws protect rescuers from being sued. That is, if you offer aid in an emergency, you can't be sued if something goes wrong. In certain areas, this only applies to people who are trained in the aid they are offering. Duty to Rescue laws are not common in the U.S., and have small penalties and are rarely enforced where they exist.

[Autumn]

Yeah the end of Seinfeld was totally wrong. Even doctors can ignore someone bleeding to death in the street with no penalty. Offduty cops are free to ignore anything they wish to, also.

Now if the guys who pulled the man in the original post from the car were nurses or otherwise professionally medically trained, they could be sued if he suffered injuries from being improperly moved because they have to perform a "reasonable" person in their profession would.

[Cindy]

Well done Kamren

Lucky you where there. I think it should be compulsory for people with a driving licence to have a basic first aid course.

Congrats.

There have been a few life savers this week!

Virginia Marie and now you.

Way to go girls and boys.

Cindy

[thestory]

Wow, I didn't expect such a response, but thank you all the same.

And hearing about everyone else's experiences with car crashes.... this has to be my second or third time almost hitting into a crash, and once I was rear ended by someone speeding and talking on their cellphone. They hadn't seen a red light.
If I remember correctly, car crashes are the number one reason for accidental death. It makes you wonder why we keep driving them. Because they are convenient I suppose.

[jesse]

well don jessica stands and applauds the valient effert put into helping this man as a former medic (military) and now law enforcement (corrections) we need more people like you in this world
hugs
Jessica

[Miniar]

Hope you're around if I ever get in a crash like that, you handled the situation very well.

[BrandiOK]

At least you were smart about it.  There are only TWO reasons to move an injured person before medical help arrives.

1.  The car is on fire or otherwise in imminent danger and that's real danger not perceived danger. The most common one I saw was "The car was smoking and about to catch on fire so we moved the person"...no, there was steam coming from the engine from anti-freeze dripping on it.  Congratulations, you just paralyzed someone for life because you got your training from TV.

2.  The person is not breathing.  The risk of further injury is a moot point if the victim is going to die without CPR.

I spent 8 years as a fire rescue EMT and have seen this happen sooooo many times.  People should never get their first aid skills, legal knowledge or overall educations from watching TV.

As for good Samaritan laws they are there to protect those who don't possess advanced training specific to the event, such as a librarian who took a basic first aid class or CPR training.  While someone from the general public may be protected from liability (assuming there is no gross negligence), someone who is a certified EMT, nurse, doctor, police officer etc. may be liable if they don't act.  The laws can be specific to individual states so there's no blanket answer. Almost certainly if an EMT, nurse, doctor, police officer etc. were to knowingly refuse or avoid the rendering of service or help they would face severe consequences from their employer.  There have been many cases of these people facing legal charges for not assisting when it was reasonable to do so.