Tim and I were on the way to Chester, Va. from Fairfax, Va. Tim was driving our 15 passenger van. We were in the right lane going the speed limit, which is slower than everything else was moving on I-95.
We were just south of Quantico, when a semi-truck started to pass us on the left. But instead of passing us he started coming into our lane! By the time that his windshield was even with ours he had half the lane and Tim was laying on the horn. The shoulder was closed for construction and was filled with orange barrels. The semi just kept coming over. Tim took to the closed shoulder. Parts of barrels and glass from our right headlight went flying everywhere. Some barrels knocked down others, like pins in a bowling alley. The van took out 4-6 barrels, but Tim did not lose control. It was like something out of the movies.
Our little dog came flying forward onto the ice chest between our seats as Tim applied the breaks. The semi took our lane. He never even slowed down. How does one miss a 15 passenger white van? Praise God that we were in the van, as the Jetta would never have been able to to blow through the barrels.
We were pretty shaken up, but we were not hurt. The dog gave Tim a dirty look and a snort as though it were all his fault, but she wasn’t hurt either. We did get the trucks license plate number, but the State Police said that they could do nothing because he had not had physical contact with us. There must be something that can be done about this kind of thing.
We both just praised the Lord that we were not killed and that there was not a major semi/van wreck that caused a huge pile up. God was with us on January 16, 2009 that is for sure.
