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Three tires on a 15 passenger van doesn't work too well...

I will start this post off with the most significant story from my weekend; afterall, I almost died.  Transportation to and from Annapolis was provided by Army 15 passenger vans. On Friday I picked up the vans for the team and decided I would drive one of them to Annapolis (based largely on my inability to sleep in vehicles and me being a control freak).  Although the traffic was horrible through NYC and Jersey we didn't have any incidents on the way down. However, this morning was different.

When I checked out the van on Friday I noticed it had a bit of a "rattle" (for lack of better term).  Our coach, a Major, noticed this too, but there was hardly anything we could do about it.  Besides, the van had almost 120K miles on it. This morning we were making really good time. I was driving with traffic, not passing too much or vice-versa. After one rest stop for food and fuel I noticed the rattle seemed a bit stronger - but didn't pay too much attention.  We were in New Jersey on the Turnpike and I was going around 80mph - more or less - in the fast lane. Then it happened.  

BOOM! I instantly lost control of the van and found myself thrown from the fast lane into the emergency lane headed straight for the concrete median divider of an overpass. The van behind me swerved into the right lane and flew around me and to my right. The cars surround me were adjusting to the other van's sudden move and swerving to avoid the pieces of rubber flying up in the air.  I held onto the wheel, not quite sure what to do. It happened so fast.  I remember wandering if I should intentionally try to put that piece of shit van into the concrete barrier to help slow me down and avoid a multi-car pile up. Somehow I couldn't deal with putting it in the wall.    

I had no control of the Chevy Express as it decided how to move with 3 wheels and a hubcap in the fast lane.  My hands immediately gripped the wheel at 10 and 2 as I tried to keep the wheel from moving with all my strength.  In reality, the wheel was moving my arms around like spaghetti. 

We started to slow: 70, 60, 50, 40, 30, 20, 10 and then nothing.

On my left about a foot from the vehicle was the concrete median. On my right another foot or so were the uninterested motorists going about business in the Turnpike's fast lane. For some reason I undid my seatbelt, threw open the door (hitting the concrete median) and hopped out.  The front left tire was shredded and the wheel well was a bit disfigured. I don't know what caused the blow-out. I didn't hit anything and nothing hit me. It was just a freak accident.

No one was hurt.

The NJ state police officer soon drove up, told us he would call someone to tow us (in a roundabout 2 hour way), implaced a few flares and got the hell out of there.  He must have realized that we weren't in the safest place to be in the state of New Jersey.  I kept thinking about a video they used to show us in drivers ed when a police officer's car on the side of the interstate was destroyed by a passing motorist that didn't stay in their lane.  I laughed when they showed it in drivers ed but, I didn't think it was quite as funny this time.  Needless to say, I was a bit on edge after that. Sure, everything turned out alright - but it could have been - and definitely should have been - a lot worse than it was.  The Major with us came up afterwards, shook my hand and said something to the affect of, 'Thanks for saving our asses and not getting us killed.'

 I guess I was lucky today.

More later...