not good

Last night, after we had already been asleep, Nate jumped out of bed and looked out the window. It was at that moment I realized I had been hearing sirens. Nate pointed out the sirens stopped right in front of our house. Many of our neighbors began gathering out on the sidewalk (for those of you who haven't been to our home - we are in a cluster of townhomes surrounding a courtyard. We are the house facing the street, but set very far back from the street and all of the homes are behind an iron fence and gate). Before I know it Nate is out there with the neighbors. So I get on my robe (quite a sight I'm sure, wearing my flannel pjs and my big, fluffy robe with my Teva flip flops), and walk out on the porch in time to hear our neighbor say, "Nathan, you didn't park your car on the street did you?" Well, of course he did, he always does. But when I looked over to where he had parked, his car was gone and in its place were two STL PD cruisers. I thought, "surely they wouldn't tow his car just so the cops could park there." Making my way to the side walk, with my flip flops crunching on something on the sidewalk, I see a black car all crumpled up by a pole and I think, "this can't be our car, it wasn't even parked here." But just the same, our license plate was very legible and it certainly was our car (or used to be). And all that crunching underfoot was the tiny glass crumbles of our windshield and other windows.

So you are wondering, what happened? The details are still forthcoming. But I will at this point tell you there were at least 12-15 squad cars, two fire engines and some ambulances that we missed. Later the CSI van/truck arrived and after that a few helicopters. The basic story says that several neighborhoods over to our West (probably over two miles away) the "alleged" criminal(s) fired shots at someone and then attempted to fire at the police (it was only an attempt because he didn't have any bullets left). The police began their pursuit of Mr. Alleged (that is what I'll call him, I guess). And of course Mr. Alleged didn't surrender. Instead he sped away from them through residential areas, mind you, at speeds up to 120 MPH. When he got in front of our house the car he was driving (a Mercedes SUV) spun out of control and hit Nate's car (NOT a Mercedes) and then hit another car (which was moving and sadly had passengers) which then flipped (the car with passengers). Click here for news story. "Mr. Alleged's" car caught on fire at that point and the chase ended. Nate said he had heard the inital "crunch" we guess of his car and that is what woke him up. Click here for more coverage.

So I guess we need a new car. I feel awful about the other passengers, one was DOA at SLU hospital, another is in critical condition, and the other "sustained major injuries." I am so thankful that as far as the damage to us, it is just a car. All of Nate's stuff is in the trunk (like his stethoscope - if you ever wonder why your Dr.'s stethoscope is always so cold, its because he/she keeps it in the trunk!) But we're hopeful we can get it back. So now we wait and see if we really are "in good hands" with Allstate. Stay tuned.