Students get a glimpse of horrors caused by drinking and driving

PINE PLAINS — A group of teenagers climbed over the fence at the Stissing Mountain Middle /High School football field, running across the wet morning grass. They were moving toward a car wreck involving two sedans, one of which had slammed into the driver’s side of the other car. The teenagers were screaming in disbelief as they approached.

Stissing  Mountain’s DWI Mock Crash event was underway. The scene unfolded:

Six of their classmates were in the two vehicles, five slumped over inside the cars, unconscious. The other, a girl who had been seated in the passenger seat of one of the vehicles, had been thrown forward upon impact, breaking through the windshield. Her dead body lay like a rag doll across the hood, a bloodied gash across her forehead.

The teenagers reached the cars one by one as emergency sirens sounded in the distance, steadily increasing in volume and intensity. In a matter of minutes first responders were everywhere, parked alongside the wreckage. Ambulances and fire trucks were next, followed by police cars, and in the span of five minutes what started as a deathly quiet scene was a cacophony of noise, a blur of rescue squad workers, firefighters and police officers.

It was at this point that the crowd of middle and high school students watching in the football bleachers was most quiet. As any number of teachers would attest, it’s nearly impossible to get the undivided attention of so many teenagers at once. Pine Plains’ DWI Mock Crash event is the exception. The impact of watching the aftermath of a car crash unfold in front of their eyes  (even if it was fictional) is undeniable.

The DWI Mock Crash event is only held by Pine Plains sporadically, explained the school’s district director for health and physical education, Steve DeLuca.

“It’s not something you want to do every year,� he said after the event. “It would be too common, for lack of a better word. It’s so much more impactful when its a four- to five-year program.�

DeLuca started the event in 1997, after reading that school districts across the country were holding similar programs. He organizes the student side, along with sponsorship from the school’s SADD (Students Against Drunnk Driving) chapter, while Pine Plains First Rescue Squad Lieutenant Ronnie Brenner organizes the emergency responders. The mock crash last Friday, May 14, marked the fourth time Pine Plains has held the event.

The mock crash itself lasted more than an hour, unfolding in real time using student actors from Stissing Mountain’s advanced drama program, rescue workers from Pine Plains and Milan as well as the Pine Plains Police Department. With the emergency responders on the scene, the cars were slowly torn apart to reach the victims trapped inside. The entire roof was cut off one vehicle. Students were pulled out of the cars by rescue workers and carried out on stretchers into ambulances. The dead  girl’s body, the only immediate casualty, was placed on the grass between the car crash and the bleachers early on, an uncomfortable reminder throughout the remainder of the enactment.

Coordinating the event started all the way back in September, with trying to find a day when rescue workers would be able to take time off from their daytime jobs to participate. The drama program itself spent months preparing, despite the fact that most students admitted that in the heat of the moment their improv took on a life of its own.

Following the actual mock crash, the school filed into the auditorium to hear from guest speakers, including the student actors, who spoke about the emotional impact of playing out those roles.

Nick Terhune acted the role of the drunk driver who had left a party to get more alcohol against the advice of his friends, and said that despite months of practice, the actual event was a blur.

“We all met up at the firehouse at 7 a.m.,� he said, “and it seemed like the next moment the cars had crashed. That’s how it can really happen, and it really hits hard. Imagine some of your closest friends being in that kind of an accident.�

Many of the actors said they lost themselves in their roles, some still physically shaking half an hour after the performance finished, and several attested to having an intense feeling of anger toward Terhune for being the drunk driver who caused the accident, despite knowing it wasn’t real.

“The feeling was really overwhelming,� said Christine Solazzo.

“Even if you don’t care about yourself, think about the other people you impact,� Lithia Helmreich told the audience. “Everybody is going to be affected by your choices.�

It was emotional to the point of tears for several of the student actors, and through a show a hands a large number of students attested to having a family member who was involved in a drunk driving accident.

“I’m 18 years old and I’ve been to many funerals,� said Tomm Gomm, one of the student actors who is also a volunteer firefighter. “I’ve seen a lot, and the devastation of seeing the families [after a deadly accident] is absolutely unbelievable.�

Another student broke down crying, saying that her sister was in a debilitating car accident after smoking marijuana, reminding students in the audience that it wasn’t just drunk driving that was deadly but any kind of impaired driving.

Perhaps the most impactful speaker was Pine Plains graduate Alex Karpf, who has been confined to a wheelchair since a drunk-driving accident in 1990 at the age of 20.

“It was the worst decision of my life,� he said, “and it’s been a very tough life for me.� Karpf acknowledged that although he thought he had put the accident behind him, seeing the mock crash was “very moving and very touching.�

Karpf warned students that he once thought he could handle drinking and driving, as he imagined some teenagers in the audience were probably thinking.

“If I had any chance in the world I would love to take that night back,� he confided, thanking the Pine Plains Rescue Squad for saving his life that night.