Passersby help crash victims
Talk about being in the right place at the right time.
With dark skies and drizzling cold rain Friday afternoon, Jennifer Satterfield of Queen City, Texas, was on her way home and looking forward to an evening spent warm and dry.
In an instant, her frame of reference changed.
Headed south on U.S. Highway 59, Satterfield came across a car crash at the busy highway and Farm to Market Road 2148.
Startled at the sudden appearance of debris scattered across the roadway, including a large, mangled scrap of bumper, she braced for the worst.
A compact car, its left front end crushed almost to the driver’s door, looked swallowed in a deep ditch. Its windshield was foggy and pocked with fractures.
On the passenger side, the glass had partially detached and was sagging into the car.
Satterfield scanned for movement and saw none.
“The car was smoking. I was freaking out,” she said.
Satterfield is a first responder at her workplace, Cooper Tire & Rubber Co., and her EMT training kicked in.
“I grabbed my mouth barrier (for use while administering cardiopulmonary resuscitation). I thought I was going to have to give CPR,” she said.
Before she could wheel into a nearby driveway, two young men had gotten out of the car and were slowly making their way up the ditch’s steep, slippery sides.
Pulling in to park, she caught sight of a box truck, rear fender smashed and taillights broken, on a small hill that framed one side of an extension of the ditch the other car was lodged in.
Out of her car, Satterfield noted muddy tire tracks peeling off at the highway’s edge. Depressions were plowed through the wet ditch and grass where the truck had skidded up the hillside.
The truck’s driver, Gerri Chapman of Texarkana, was out of the vehicle and walking toward Satterfield.
Brad Lacefield, 21, of Genoa, and Ross Williams, 31, of Linden, were also coming toward her.
While checking for injuries, Satterfield learned the young men, traveling in a 2007 Nissan Versa, rear-ended Chapman as she pulled onto the highway from a convenience store parking lot parallel to FM 2148.
“We were coming through the light (caution flashers) when I saw her. By the time we got around the curve, it was too late. I couldn’t stop, and I couldn’t get out of the way. She was probably doing 35 or 40 (mph). She was getting going. I was doing about 70. I tried to swerve, but it was too late to even try and do one last thing. I didn’t want to hit her. I would rather do something to put myself in danger than put someone else in danger, hurt someone else,” said Williams, driver of the car. “I laid on the brakes, and that’s when I lost control. We spun around and ended up in that ditch.”
“I don’t really know what happened. I had just pulled out of the store, back there, and they hit me,” Chapman said.
Chapman said she’d recently bought the 1998 Chevrolet box truck, the sides of which were trimmed with the Golden Flake logo.
She’d just delivered snacks to a convenience store at the corner of U.S. 59 and FM 2148 when the crash occurred.
Lacefield and Williams suffered bruises and minor contusions from airbags and seatbelts.
Chapman had a bruised and bloody nose where her face hit her steering wheel.
No one appeared seriously hurt, to Satterfield’s relief and amazement.
“Looking at the car, I thought it was going to be a lot worse. It’s a miracle no one was hurt worse ... or killed,” she said.
Understanding physical trauma suffered in crashes is not always obvious and that shock was a distinct possibility, Satterfield knew the victims needed to stay still, dry and warm.
Satterfield said a woman whose home was near the accident site brought blankets and water for the crash victims.
A traveler stopped and gave the group an umbrella.
“People are good,” Satterfield said.
Blankets around their shoulders, Lacefield and Williams passed a cigarette.
Williams called his mother, who immediately set out from Marshall to pick up her son and his friend.
“I told her I could call Christy, but she wouldn’t have it. She’s on her way,” Williams said.
“That’s a mom. She’s going to be here for her child,” Satterfield said, smiling.
Chapman hugged her coat close and called her son.
Soon, volunteer responders, DPS troopers and an ambulance were on scene.
Satterfield continued tending to each victim, making sure each was warm and as dry as possible.
She said she would stay until each victim left the crash site.
“I was the first one here. It’s kind of amazing, being a first responder and all, that I came along when I did. I guess it was meant to be,” she said.
Each victim said they would go by private vehicle to local hospitals to be assessed, for safety’s sake.
Trooper Adam Head led the crash investigation.