She was driving north on the freeway towards Bountiful. It was July and still hot in the early evening. The sun wouldn’t set for another couple of hours-it was still 100 degrees outside. She thought all this and then noticed her car started losing power even though the engine was still running. Was the heat doing this to her car?
She flipped her turn signals on and looked to her right to pull over. There was a car there so she would have to wait until they passed to move over. Her car was still slowing down so she turned on the emergency flashers.
She thought she was safely stopping and moving to the right hand lane, when she felt and heard a boom. A force like nothing she had ever experienced blew into the rear end of the car. She was snapped back into her seat belt. Fear grabbed her then and wouldn’t let go.
Adrenaline, a mother’s adrenaline kicked in. Her daughter, her daughter in the back seat was all she could think about. Fear and fire grabbed her attention. Why was there fire? The back seat, fire everywhere on the right side of the car. The flames were around her little girl. Her child was on fire.
Her daughter was in the back middle seat. She was in a booster seat with her seat belt on. Her clothes were on fire and she was screaming for her mother to help her. She reached from the front to the back seat, through the flames and heat to unsnap the seat belt. The belt was searing hot, but she didn’t know that until later when the burns on her hands were treated.
She pulled her six-year old daughter out of her booster seat into the front seat and out of the car. Her daughter was on fire, her skin was melting and falling off as she carried her to safety and put out the flames. The pain for her daughter was indescribable. She tries not to remember that night. If we go to trial, she will have to remember it all and live it again.
The following days were the longest ever as the University of Utah Hospital’s Burn Center worked to save the child’s life. Later they worked to graft skin and attempt to make her look more like the child she had once been but would never be again.
The sweet voice her child once had is now a raspy whisper. Her voice and lungs damaged from the heat, fire and inhaled flames. Her child arms are covered in thick, unsightly burn scars. Her hands don’t move freely-scar tissue makes her fingers look webbed. It’s hard for her to hold a pencil much less use a key board. What does the future hold for this child?
A plastic safety valve failed in the gas tank when the car was rear-ended by another car on the freeway. Gas fumes escaped and ignited the back seat of the car.
Siegfried and Jensen lawyers are working to assure this child financial freedom from on-going medical care and all future surgeries. This child’s future job choices are now so limited. Wouldn’t it be fair to provide the child with a lifetime annuity to help ease her burden when she is older? Her life has already been so difficult.
