Description

On Saturday, February 27th, I was driving east along Route 1 in Groton at 2:30 PM. As I was passing the Stop and Go Transmission shop at 1023 Poquonnock Road (in front of the Big Y store), the car immediately in front of me veered suddenly to the left. I could quickly see why. In front of me were two chunks of what appeared to be chunks of dirty ice that had dropped off a car. This was a reasonable assumption since it had been snowing for days.

I had three options: 1) run over the ice chunks, 2) veer to the left as well. Unfortunately there were oncoming cars, so that was not really an option. Option 3) straddle the chunks and hope for the best. I quickly opted for the third option. Unfortunately, these were not ice chunks, but large sections of the curb that had been torn up by a snow plow that ended up in right-center area of the driving lane.

I pushed one of the curb-chunks to the side of the road so no one else would hit them. I then picked up the chunk that I hit. It is in my garage. I immediately drove my car into the Valvoline Center a block away leaking oil and smoke coming from under the car. The crew at Valvoline had me turn off the car immediately. They rolled the car into the shop and looked at the car from below. They reported a huge hole in the crushed oil pan which had also been shoved up into the transmission/engine area. This obviously rendered the car undrivable. The diagnosis is bleak. The official estimate comes to me tomorrow. This wil cost me AT LEAST $500 - which is my deductible.