A father who was the victim of a violent road accident last weekend tries to find the good Samaritan who stopped to help him, his daughter and their dog, in order to thank him.
“He’s a guardian angel. He came and he went,” says Dave Ferrara, 48, with a lump in his throat, still shaken by his misadventure last Sunday.
That evening, around 11:30 p.m., the Terrebonne resident was returning home with his 16-year-old daughter, after picking her up from her workplace, and their 1-year-old labrador, Samy.
Photo courtesy, DAVE FERRARA
Dave Ferrara in the company of son Labrador, Samy.
He was calmly driving on Highway 640 when, in a split second, the car in front of him tried to avoid a deer that came out of nowhere.
It then spun on the slippery road due to the rain, making the collision inevitable.
“I got into it. We went head-to-head at 100 km/h. I didn’t have time to do anything,” Mr. Ferrara recalls with difficulty, his voice trembling.
Stuck
By his estimate, no fewer than six airbags deployed in his black Buick Envista SUV, which had become a total loss, as he hit the guardrail on the left shoulder.
“There was a lot of noise because of the cushions. My daughter Olivia thought the car was on fire. She shouted: ‘Dad, I don’t want to die’,” says the man who tried as best he could to reassure his daughter, while realizing that they were stuck in the passenger compartment because of the guardrail and the cushions.
When he finally managed to open a window, Mr. Ferrara also noticed that the vehicles on the highway were not slowing down at all alongside them, and that the danger was still real.
“That’s when I started to panic. I saw the worst coming,” he said, because he feared being hit a second time.
Disappeared
Then, it was then that the ex-restaurateur and tour director heard a voice asking him if everything was okay.
“I said, ‘Yes, help us get out,’” Mr. Ferrara recalled. He went to get a knife to pierce one of the cushions, and he pulled us all out the driver’s window.
Within seconds, first responders arrived on the scene, and the 40-year-old and his daughter did not have the chance to greet this good Samaritan.
The only
“I can’t even put a face to it. We were too nervous, he admits. What makes me even more emotional is that he faded away. He did not seek recognition.”
“He did everything. It was the only one who stopped, continues Mr. Ferrara. He put himself at risk. The way my vehicle was stopped, it was excessively dangerous.”
“We would like to at least find him to thank him and shake his hand,” he concludes.
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