It happened about 4 this morning. I don’t know if I was already awake or if it woke me up.
Not the squeal of tires. More like the sound of air brakes. And then a boom.
A big BOOM!
I lay there a minute trying to figure it out. No sirens. But definitely something not right.
I scrambled out of bed, wandered around the dark house, and peered out the windows. Had to be an accident. But I saw nothing, so I started back to bed. And then I heard something else.
Thunder? An explosion?
And then my phone rang. Abby.
“Mom! An accident on the highway. Fire!”
And then finally sirens. Lots of sirens.
I ran out back through the wet grass to watch the flames shoot toward the sky about a quarter mile away.
And when the flames died, we heard saws.
Details still unclear. Two semis involved? Original reports indicated a tanker. Apparently not so. One passing another? One left the scene? One driver injured?
Someone said, “It was an Old Dominion truck pulling twin 28 ft van trailers. The passenger side fuel tank on the Old Dominion truck hit the landing legs of the other truck and started the fire.”
Whatever that means.
The truth is they are still trying to piece it all together
And it’s a mess out there. Steady stream of traffic rerouted off highway, across the road, and back on. Workmen and trucks and officers still on the job 8 hours later. Still a faint scent of burnt rubber. Lives disrupted. People hurt.
From our perspective, it seemed impossible for anyone to survive.
That’s the problem with human perspective. It’s limited. Things are not always what they seem. We don’t know the whole story. Speculation masks truth. Rumors spread. Lives are disrupted. People are hurt.
The tongue is a fire.
“It only takes a spark, remember, to set off a forest fire. A careless or wrongly placed word out of your mouth can do that. By our speech we can ruin the world, turn harmony to chaos, throw mud on a reputation, send the whole world up in smoke and go up in smoke with it, smoke right from the pit of hell.” (James 3:5-6 – Message)
This we know for sure at this moment:
1. There was an accident.
2. There was a big fire.
3. A semi burned.
4. There were many responders.
5. There was sawing.
6. A short stretch of highway was closed.
I deleted all my early posts from Twitter and Facebook about this early morning drama.
Waiting for the whole story.
Copyright © 2010 by Sandra Heska King
Assumptions are so easy to make … and spread.
We live in a world where people have become consumed with assuming.
What a wise woman of God to wait for the whole matter to be revealed praying all the while!
Assumptions and the tongue have injuried me just this week – the comfort – God is my protector and while I may not be able to do anything about the damage I can trust my God to protect me and allow the truth to come forth.
Why is it that we assume and then spread those assumptions without thinking about the people we might be hurting… sigh…
Let us know what happened!!!
I think I wish you were a reporter. They'd all do well to stop assuming and just report the facts. 🙂
Brenda is right. You would make a good reporter.
Well written, fun to read, just right.
You have such a nice, light touch on the keyboard. Love it.
@Susan: And I'm as guilty as the next person.
@Melinda: I'm learning–slowly.
@Sharon: It hurts. But I'm so glad He is our strength and our shield!
@Brenda: LOL. If I had known journalism was an option back in the day, I might have gone for it.
@Cassandra: Aw, thanks. I don't think I'm pushy enough to be a good reporter. 😉
@Duane: It's old news now and still discrepancies between newspaper and TV reports. The closest is this: No tanker involved. Semi hit the other while passing. The hitter semi burned. The driver bailed out and was taken to hospital with "non-life-threatening injuries. The hit truck drove ahead, but then stopped to extinguish fire on his truck. He was not injured. Fuel spilled on highway and also burned. The newspaper's last report had police searching for semi that did not stop. So unless there was a third one . . . but not mentioned at all on any TV station.