Accident Reenactment Drives Home Sobering Message

The scene in the Lake Zurich High School parking lot on Wednesday afternoon was grim.

A driver emerged from a maroon vehicle that had collided with a Ford Explorer. Clearly impaired, he stumbled around in his tuxedo, struggling to gather up the beer cans that littered the pavement. While the driver's head was bleeding, the passengers of his own vehicle and those of the Ford were clearly suffering worse. In his own vehicle, the passenger from the front seat had crashed through the windshield and was draped, motionless, across the hood.

The driver of the Ford was slumped over the steering wheel, one arm hanging out of the driver's side window. Another passenger lay motionless on the pavement next to the Ford.

This may have been a reenactment, but the event's impact on students was palpable. While most watched intently as emergency crews extricated passengers and draped some with white sheets, some students wiped away tears or even left the area to avoid watching.

The reenactment was part of a pre-prom assembly to warn students of the dangers of driving impaired.

"It only takes one person under the influence of drugs, under the influence of alcohol … that causes one mistake," Orlando Portillo, senior deputy coroner with the Lake County Coroner's Office, told the students. "That one mistake ruins a lot of people's lives."

Local emergency officials, including from the Lake Zurich Fire and Police Departments and the Long Grove Fire Department, participated in the reenactment. They shattered windows on the vehicles and removed doors to extricate passengers, all of whom were Lake Zurich High School drama students. Most of the bloodied passengers were placed on stretchers and carried to nearby ambulances. A couple of passengers lay on the ground in body bags. 

The scene was shocking for seniors Renee Howarth and Kait Wood.

"It was our friends," Howarth said of the students in the reenactment. "I think because we knew the students, it affected us more."

Wood added that it's scary to think about something like that actually happening, given that she and her friends will be attending prom on Saturday in the same groups as the students in the reenactment.

Stopping something like that from happening is a matter of making the right choices, said Twyla Blakely, a victims services coordinator with the Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists. She and a couple other speakers, including a mom whose daughter died in a drunk driving accident, talked to the students after the reenactment.

"When you choose to get behind the wheel and you've been drinking, it's no longer an accident," said Blakely. "You can do everything that you think is right, but you can make a bad choice."

She talked about a girl who went to a sleepover that ultimately resulted in the girl and her friends attending a party.

"There was no supervision in the house and the drinks flowed," said Blakely.

While the girl didn't drink, her friends did. When the car the girl was riding in with six other people crashed into a tree, the girl, along with four others, was killed. Her family was left to deal with the loss.

"This is what I see every day - hurt, broken people," Blakely said of the victim's family. "It's never going to be alright ever again."

Peggy Lamarche talked about the loss of her daughter, Heather, who was killed in a car accident.

"In August 2007, our lives changed forever," said Lamarche. Her daughter, a Mundelein High School graduate, "was killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver." She suffered a fractured skull and numerous internal injuries.

"It's very hard to deal with the death of a child," an emotional Lamarche told the students. "So I'm asking you to do something for me - do not get in a car drunk … because I do not want you guys to have a story like ours. This is one club you do not want to join."

The students also heard from a 24-year-old woman who, in 2008, caused an accident that resulted in the death of a man. The woman was not only under the influence of alcohol when she drove, but she was also exhausted, having been awake for 24 hours.

"The only good driver out there is the sober driver," said Blakely, adding that it is also important to not be a distracted driver. "Please think about your choices."