Car Crashes, Friends and Lucky Horseshoes

As you may have heard, Pack & Paddle made the news last week. A freak traffic accident on Pinhook Road sent a Mitsubishi Galant into the front of our building. I thought that we would blog this week on the event so that you could see some photos of the accident.

Becky and I were out of town when we got a frantic call from Skip. “A car has crashed into the building! It’s inside the shop!”. Wow – you don’t get a call like that everyday. Skip was with a customer only 8 feet away from where the car came through the wall. No wonder he was shaken up! Jamie said “I heard a crash and started walking towards the window. That’s when I heard vrrrooooom and the car came through the window”.

What happened was that the Galant was rear ended on Pinhook. The drivers foot became pinned to the accelerator, taking her over the grassy corner, through the parking lot, between two cars, over the bike rack, over the blue ski chairs, through the small cypress fence and through the wall of the shop.

911 was called and the driver was extracted from the car. Then the car was extracted from the building and our staff did their best to clean up the mess. Mark Menou put some plywood up to seal the hole for the night and everyone headed home.

In thinking back, it’s amazing how lucky we were in how things turned out. First and foremost, nobody was hurt (including the driver!). Secondly, the car came through the building in an area with a high beam – so no structural supporting posts were knocked out. Lastly, we were surrounded by friends that helped us through the event. Thanks go out to Harold Schoeffler and Mark Menou who were on the scene helping us to get the building secured. Also thanks to all who emailed and called with offers to help clean up, hammer nails and do whatever it took to get us operating again. My brother called and said that his 6 and 8 year old sons had seen the news and wanted to give us their money and their help to get P&P up and running again.

The picture below is very interesting. Notice the car in the building. Take a closer look at the hood and you’ll see a lucky horseshoe that fell onto the hood of the car as it came into the building. This is like a sign that all things eventually turn out for the best. We are surrounded by friends and a community that showed they really care. Our shop is now all fixed up and ready for Christmas. We are so appreciative to all of you and look forward to the future!