INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - Kira Hudson was driving, but her attention was on her phone conversation. She was arguing with her boyfriend, one hand on the phone and one on the wheel as she turned onto tree-lined Mill Creek Road near SR-38 in Hamilton County.
She remembers so many things about that day: “1, 2 Step” playing on the radio, the deserted road ahead of her. But she can’t remember what exactly she and her boyfriend were arguing about. Yet as the then-20-year-old drove down that road on Jan. 31, 2005, she was laser-focused on her call.
Movement caught her eye - a squirrel in the middle of the road. She was only driving about 20 mph, but instead of slowing down as she normally would, she panicked.
Still clutching the phone, she cranked the wheel to the right. It was too hard. She dropped her phone to grab the wheel with both hands, turning quickly to the left. Still too much force. Hudson rapidly corrected to the right. The car flipped.
It landed on the driver’s side, facing the opposite direction of traffic. The top of the car caved into a row of trees. Hudson was pinned down, the roof collapsing above her.
Later, the doctors told her she would never walk again.
And despite all that she has been through, she considers herself lucky.
“It doesn’t look like it, but I was very fortunate in my crash,” she said. “I’m still here today. I didn’t hurt anyone else. If I would have hurt someone, I don’t think I would have had the same outlook as I do now.”
Distracted driving kills approximately nine people every day in the U.S., according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The Indiana Criminal Justice Institute reports that each year since 2015, there were just over 1,200 collisions on Indiana roads where a cellphone or other electronic device was a factor, resulting in 40 total fatalities.
Several hands-free bills have been introduced in the Indiana General Assembly over the years, but none have become law. This year, lawmakers are hoping it will be different with HB 1070, which would prohibit using or holding an electronic device while in the driver’s seat of a moving vehicle. It has the backing of Gov. Eric Holcomb, among others.
On Jan. 22, supporters of HB 1070, including Hudson, packed a small hearing room at the Indiana Statehouse to testify to the House Roads and Transportation Committee. With the seats filled, many had to stand in the back or wait out in the hallway during the nearly 2 1/2 hour hearing. Twenty individuals spoke out, including those affected by distracted driving collisions.
At the end of the hearing, the committee voted unanimously to advance the bill, which later passed the House. It now moves on to the Senate and, potentially, to the governor’s desk.
After the crash, Hudson was able to retrieve her phone from the floor. She tried to call her parents.
“In that second that went through in my mind it’s minutes,” Hudson said. “I thought I was just stuck in a ditch and didn’t think it was that bad.”
Her calls wouldn’t go through. Two people stopped to help. A woman called 911, while a man came up to the window to check on Hudson. She told him she was trying to reach her parents. He called them on his own phone.
“I heard him ask for a Mr. Hudson, my dad,” she recalled. “Then he told them that they should come to where they were at because he didn’t think I was going to make it to say goodbye.”
The impact caused Hudson’s feet to jut underneath the pedals. Her chest was pressed facing the driver’s side door, her head near the driver’s side seat belt buckle. The air bag deployed after the crash.
She was trapped in the car for 90 minutes before firefighters were able to free her.
Hudson was conscious the entire time and remembers every detail: The feel of the good Samaritan’s hand firmly squeezing hers. The sound of glass shattering as first responders broke into her car. The smell of coffee on the firefighter’s breath who got in the car to help her settle down.
“He apologized and I said no, it was good, it was soothing,” she said. “Still to this day when I smell coffee, I’m instantly just calm because he helped me through a lot.”
A police officer asked her to explain what happened. He became stern when he heard her story.
“He said he had seen this many times with cellphones and with people reacting to animals, and lots of dangers that come with those,” she said. “He said to just run the animal over and get off the cell phone.”
Hudson’s entire family, including her parents and five siblings, were by her side at the hospital as the doctor explained her prognosis. A tear rolled down her cheek, but then she looked at her family members, who she said were “falling apart.” She needed clarification.
“I kept saying, ’Does that mean I’m going to walk?’ and he just kept repeating ’bear weight,’” Hudson said. “Finally he said yes, that I would never be able to walk again.”
Before the crash, she had never thought about the dangers of using a cellphone while driving. The guilt took over her again during rehab.
“I met people who had work accidents, injuries caused by someone else,” she said. “A lot of people just had these really powerful and impactful stories. I just kept thinking everything that happened to me was because of a stupid cellphone.”
Last August, Tina and Lorin Smith were testing the route of a motorcycle ride in memory of Tina’s granddaughter. The Smiths were headed west on U.S. 40 back to Indianapolis when they pulled their motorcycles off the road, one in front of the other, to check on a mechanical issue.
“We were over as far as we could possibly go,” Lorin said. “I was flipping switches, and (Tina) turned around to ask me if everything was OK. I told her to give me a minute. She turned around to ask me again if I was OK. Then she yelled, ’Watch out!’”
Tina saw a car drifting over from the left lane. By the time she got her warning out, everything went black, Lorin said. Tina tried to jump off her bike.
“I could see debris flying around me; I saw my left shoe in the air,” she said. “As soon as I landed, the pain in my leg really hit me. I started screaming in pain it was so bad, and screaming for my husband. I could hear him scream and stop, and scream and stop. I didn’t know if he was alive.”
Tina said the driver of the car that hit them rushed over. The driver said that she didn’t see them and that she had only looked at her daughter’s phone for a second. The driver later told police that her daughter either showed her a photo on her cellphone or she had looked down at the dashboard area when she struck the Smiths, according to a police report.
The driver began praying.
“At that moment I forgave her,” Tina said. “I looked at my cellphone (while driving); I texted, too. It’s lucky I didn’t hit anybody.”
Lorin was thrown 20 feet into a grassy area. When he came to, he could hear Tina screaming.
“My first instinct was to get to her,” he said.
Passing motorists pulled over to help, yanking off their belts for makeshift tourniquets. Lorin even took off his own belt and used it on himself. He called it a “war scene.” They were airlifted on separate helicopters to St. Vincent’s Hospital.
The Smiths had almost identical injuries. Tina’s left arm was broken, and Lorin’s left elbow fractured. Both of their left legs were amputated at the knee.
The couple was separated at the hospital, but on one occasion while being moved, the nurses were able to get them close enough to briefly hold hands. Tina knew Lorin’s leg was amputated, but he didn’t know about hers yet. He was still reeling from his loss. After he left the ICU, Tina broke the news.
“It was really devastating,” Lorin said. “Here I am dealing with my issue, hoping she didn’t sustain anything like I did. I went into protection mode … I wanted to comfort her and make sure she was okay. She reacted totally the opposite from what I thought.”
During the recovery process, the Smiths were thankful to have each other.
“She knew what I was going through, and I knew what she was going through,” Lorin said. “We could understand the phantom pain issues, what it felt like. We could understand each other.”
Lorin is still angry when he talks about the lasting effects of the crash. They were out of work for five months, and both did two stints in rehab. They had to modify their home and will need new wheelchairs and prosthetic legs every few years.
“Here we are out doing something good,” he said. “We took all the precautions; we had reflective gear on, our helmets on. We couldn’t have been better protected. And someone who’s distracted takes us out, and here we are suffering.”
No charges were filed against the driver. Hancock County prosecutor Brent Eaton said cases like these are “really, really hard” for law enforcement and the prosecutor’s office. He said in determining any potential charges, they had to look at two things.
“Is there reason to believe somebody is intoxicated?” he said. “Is there reason to believe there is reckless behavior specifically reflected in the driving behavior … ?”
He said the driver was not impaired and there was no evidence to suggest the driver was all over the road before the crash. He also said there was a “narrow path” between the road and the shoulder.
The couple lost the ability to take part in many of their favorite hobbies, like riding motorcycles and hiking. Tina said they try to channel their energy into distracted driving activism, appearing on news networks and at Gov. Holcomb’s State of the State address. Tina is even working on a book about the experience.
“I feel like God saved us for this purpose, to run with it and spread the word,” she said. “A lot of people need to see what actually happened to someone. It is our mission now in life to get the story out, and try to help change people’s ways.”
Eleven years after her first crash, Hudson’s life would once again be impacted by distracted driving. A man who admitted to being on his cellphone caused a chain reaction accident that left Hudson with head and eye injuries.
Hudson said after the first crash, she felt nervous traveling on tree-lined, country roads. After the second collision, if she sees cars braking too suddenly behind her, she braces for a possible impact. She waits until she is fully stopped to use her cellphone now and is happy when she receives automatic “do not disturb” replies from her niece.
Hudson had to give up water skiing after her accident, though she can still tube if she avoids big waves. She went skydiving on her 30th birthday.
“I am not a person who likes to exercise and never was, but there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t wish I could run and just feel that breeze on my face,” she said. “It’s not the same when you’re in a chair.”
Hudson is calm and steady when she speaks about all of the details of her accidents, of powering through rehab and getting her life back on track. But when she talks about her family, her voice breaks.
“I don’t regret my crash completely,” she said. “It taught me to be a stronger person and a better person. But what I put my family through then, it makes me wish that I had never picked up that cellphone.”
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Source: The Indianapolis Star
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