Written by Michael with editing by Gloria.
There is simply no getting around it. Today was not a good day, although for a very bad day a lot of things went really, really well. So I can't complain, but I will certainly understand if Gloria does.
We left our hotel in Newton around 6:30 in the morning so we could eat breakfast at the hotel's complimentary breakfast. The ride was fairly uneventful for the first 30 miles.
Around 10:20 am, Gloria had the bad fortune of having a driver hit her at 65 mph while looking at his phone. (Despite rumors to the contrary, the car was doing 65 mph and not Gloria. However Gloria did accelerate incredibly quickly after being hit.) The impact ripped off both of Gloria's left side panniers and knocked Gloria to the ground. As luck would have it, the side of the road where she landed had thick grass and a somewhat softer landing.
As incredible as it may seem, everything after that point went really well. A gentleman who had been traveling with us on a 3 wheel recumbent, Jayden, was in front of Gloria and heard the car hit her. The driver stopped and Jayden called 911 and asked the driver to call 911. Jayden's connection dropped, but the driver had a good connection. The driver stayed on the phone with 911 until the first responders arrived. Jayden frantically flagged down the first car to pass and asked the driver to tell me and Eric that Gloria was hit (We were over the top of the next hill). That driver's wife stayed with Gloria until the EMTs arrived. And Jayden told Gloria not to move at all.
For being so far out in the middle of nowhere, I was really impressed with how fast the local fire, sheriff, and ambulance arrived. Gloria was taken to Wichita, KS because they had a trauma center and, understandably, any bicyclist hit by a car doing 65 mph is usually traumatized. I rode in the ambulance with Gloria. This left Eric with the not so small problem of how to get 3 touring bicycles and Jayden's touring tricycle to Wichita. We were bailed out by Kelley, an incredibly kind volunteer fireman, who was the first responder to arrive. Kelley went home, got a truck, and drove Eric, Jayden, and all our bicycles and gear to the hotel across the street from the hospital in Wichita. Kelley, your generosity is beyond belief. Thank you very, very much!!!! (And my apologies if I misspelled your name.)
The wonderful staff at Wesley Medical Center evaluated Gloria and took numerous xrays and scans. Incredibly enough, nothing was broken or even fractured. That Gloria is one tough cookie! They released her within 3 hours or so, but not without warning her that she would definitely be a lot more sore and swollen in the next 48 hours.
My theory is that Gloria's elbow hurts because it was hit by the car's mirror. That mirror was completely ripped off the car. I suspect her hip hurts from when she hit the ground. The car may have grazed her hip, but my assumption is that her injuries would have been much worse had the car body hit her hip.
The handlebars of her bike were bent about 35 degrees off center and her rear light was twisted out of position, but I didn't see any other visible damage to her bike.
So we plan to take a rest day tomorrow and Tuesday to give Gloria time to heal, get her bike fixed and panniers replaced, and to figure out how to catch up on our schedule.
All in all, we have been incredibly lucky. Several people have mentioned that Bob must have been watching over Gloria in that she survived this crash with minimal injuries. Gloria however is a little upset that Bob was not doing a better job. If so, he certainly would have had that driver miss her completely!
It is great that we are all alive and well!
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