I am grateful for the many angels that were watching over us on Monday, January 16, 2012. The boys and I were driving back home to Cedar City, UT from Rock Springs, WY, we had been there for the weekend visiting James, who is there for his new job with Halliburton. When we left Rock Springs around 9:30am the weather wasn't so bad, there were a few flurries coming down but nothing major. We stopped in Green River, a little town about 10 minutes west of Rock Springs, to get fuel and some hot chocolate. The roads were clear and the flurries had stopped. We were all anxious to get home. Evanston is about 85 miles west of Rock Springs, when we were about in the middle of that drive the weather started getting scary. It had snowed the night before and the wind was strong, it was blowing the snow across the freeway. New snow started to fall and I began to get nervous. I'm not a strong driver when it comes to snow and for some reason my Excursion is really squirmy, even on a dry, clear day. Connor was starting to get fussy, he hates riding in the car for any amount of time. I had decided that I would pull over in Evanston and wait the storm out, even if it meant getting a hotel room for the night. I also knew I needed to get my Excursion into 4-wheel drive so it would handle better in the snow. I thought I needed to pull over, put the transmission into neutral before I could put it into 4-wheel drive. I later found out that I could slow down to about 20 mph and switch it over, wish I had known that then! I wasn't about to pull over on the side of the freeway, the roads were slick and the snow was coming down and there were a ton of 18-wheelers on the road, I wasn't going to put my kids in that kind of danger. I was waiting for an exit, one that wasn't snow covered. About 20 miles from Evanston I was following a semi-truck, it seemed a safe place to drive. We were in the slow lane and up ahead was a snow plow. The semi decided to move into the fast lane to pass him. I was a little unsure if that's what I wanted to do but the snow plow was only driving about 20 mph and Connor was in the back screaming so I wanted to get to Evanston. I waited for a few cars to pass and then moved over into the fast lane. I passed the snow plow easily and moved back into the slow lane. I was driving about 40 mph. I don't really remember much after that except that the Excursion started to slide. The back end started pushing forward and we were going down the freeway sideways. The front end of the Excursion hit the snow packed median, then the center guard rail. The back end passenger side also hit the guard rail and we were facing the wrong direction, the front end of the truck in the fast lane. As fast as I could I threw the Excursion into 4-wheel drive and moved us from the fast lane into the median. I would've lost it completely than but I knew I needed to stay calm for the kids. I started asking if everyone was ok. The little boys in the back were fine, I don't even know if they knew what was going on. Bailey was scared, and covered in cold hot chocolate. The major impact of the crash was on the passenger side of the truck so everything went flying towards him in the passenger seat. I called 911, which I was lucky to get through to because I had no service. Then we waited for the police and tow truck to show up. The crash happened about 11:00am, we didn't get into Evanston, which was only 20 miles away, until 2:30pm.
James was lucky enough to get out of training for the rest of the day and drive down to help me. We have a friend who lives in Evanston, we had the tow truck take the Excursion to his house and we were going to leave it there until we could figure out what to do with it. I had no idea how I was going to get home. We tried to rent a car but there are no rental car services in Evanston. We thought about going back with James to Rock Springs and staying with him until his day off (Sunday) and having him drive us back home and then him turning right around and coming back to Rock Springs, but that was crazy.
After looking over the Excursion we decided that I would drive it back to Cedar City. Luckily it still ran well, the front end shakes considerably when you get going 70 but other than that it was drivable. James put some lights in and duct taped them in place. The boys and I stayed in a hotel for the night and then got up the next morning and headed home. I will admit that I was completely panicked for the first hour and a half of the drive home. The highway between Evanston and Park City is through the mountains so there are a lot of curves and turns. Every time I saw that the roads were wet my heart would race. By the time I reached Heber my hands were really sore from holding onto the steering wheel so tightly. At one point my front tires hit a divot in the road and it pulled the truck to the right and I about had a heart attack thinking I was starting to slide again. The Excursion is currently parked in the driveway, waiting for me to take it to the body shop for an estimate. Although I drove it home James told me that I can't drive it around town, with the front end missing like it is the police would probably pull me over.
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