Parking FAIL

Last Sunday, while I was on the phone with my boss, and rapidly writing new software, there was a crashing sound from somewhere outside. Shortly afterwards, my oldest daughter came running into the house, and said there was a car in our front lawn. Indeed there was:



We all go outside to see what is going on. There's already a bunch of neighbors running towards the car from all different directions, and in the car is a dazed looking woman. At first I thought she was unconscious, but I think was just in shock. She then gets out her cell phone (or was it out the whole time?), and starts talking to someone in an asian-sounding language (definitely not Japanese, but outside of that, I couldn't tell you).

I'm still trying to understand HOW this car ended up mangled in my lawn, when I realize this car is from the neighbors across the street. I look across the street and see this:



Okay, now I'm even more confused. It appears the garage door on their house is completely mangled (much like the car), so it's fairly obvious who hit who. Now I'm just wondering how the whole thing played out. Since the only real witness to the accident was in shock, and speaking a language I didn't understand, I'm left with simple speculation. Here's what I think happened:

The car was sitting in the driveway. This woman, and 3 passengers (we found this out later from some teenagers who were down the street when it happened - the passengers ditched the car after the crash) got into the car. The driver started the car, and put it into drive instead of reverse, and stepped on the gas. After slamming into the garage, she panicked, threw it in reverse, and put the pedal to the metal. The car shot out into the street, spun around once (again, the teenagers told us this part, but who knows), and landed in our yard, backwards.

The police arrived, along with an ambulance and a fire engine. The firemen cleared the car (no fire - no imminent explosion), the paramedics carted the woman off, and about an hour later a tow truck got the car, and everything returned to normal.

I never heard any more about the woman's condition, but she seemed to be okay except for a bloody nose, and a little headache. I did ask one of the neighbors from that house about her later that evening, but they didn't know anything yet either. I hope she's all right.

Now, here's what amazes me: neither of our cars, parked in the driveway DIRECTLY ACROSS THE STREET from their driveway, were hit. The car parked in front of our neighbors house, on the street, was not hit. The grass was not uprooted, and near as I can tell, the sprinklers were undamaged. Where normally there are kids in the street, there were none (except the teenagers way down the other end of the street), and I was not mowing the lawn, like I would have been had my boss not called!

Not sure who was responsible for all that luck, but thank you!!