It happened again last night. I had the nightmare that never fails to make me sit straight up in bed, bathed in a cold sweat with tears flowing down my cheeks. Whew. That hasn’t happened in a while. Post Traumatic Stress is such a lovely experience. In this case it‘s caused by an incident several years ago on one of the drawbridges where I work.
It was a nice summer day, and I was working as a flag person. It’s a big bridge and requires two flag people because it’s a vertical lift bridge, and conceivably cars could crash the gate and drive straight into the river. So two people flag, one on each end, while one person performs the lift.
We all communicate by hand held radio, and the driver waits for us to tell him that the span is clear of cars and pedestrians before proceeding with the opening. He has way too many blind spots to rely on his own vision.
Well, on this day we both told him that there was still someone walking across the bridge. Both of us. But a barge was bearing down on us, and I guess he got flustered. Before we knew it, the bridge started to rise. We both shouted, “Stop!!!“ but he continued with the lift. He said, “Oh well, I guess she’s going for a ride.“
We were horrified. But we were even more horrified when the lady, who looked to be in her 80’s, got frightened. She assumed all drawbridges are bascule bridges, and open sort of like the leaves of a book, and that she’d slip off. So she jumped off the rising part of the bridge down to the street level. It was a 5 foot drop and she sprained her ankle.
Now she was on street level, but she was outside of the sidewalk gates, clinging to them on what had turned into, in essence, a 40 foot cliff above the river. She was hysterical. This was bad. This was really, really bad. I knew she’d be okay if she didn’t panic, but she was already agitated, and if she stepped one foot backward, she could plunge to her death.
My heart was pounding, but I had to do something, so I climbed over the railing and walked up to the sidewalk gate and grabbed her by the shoulders. I said, “Look at me. Don’t worry. I’ve got you. You’re going to be all right. Just stay right there. I’ve got you.“ I didn’t want her to look behind her, or look down, or move. I needed her to stay calm, and the last thing I need was for her to see that I was freaking out inside.
I kept talking to her during the 5 minute opening, which I’m sure felt like an eternity to her. God knows it did to me.
Finally, the bridge closed, the sidewalk gate opened, and she threw herself into my arms while she cried, that chest-heaving kind of cry most of us don’t do very often. That nearly destroyed me. She was about 90 pounds soaking wet, so her body felt like my mother’s, who had passed away 16 years previously. It felt very, very personal to me.
I asked her if she wanted an ambulance. She said no, she just wanted to get off the bridge. But to do that she had to go back the way she came, limping the whole time, and she was afraid the bridge would open up on her again, so I said I would walk with her.
Meanwhile, the bridgetender who was driving was already trying to cover his butt. So he was screaming profanity at me on the radio, trying to claim I hadn’t told him anyone was there. I had to tell him to shut up, as the lady could hear him.
I finally sent her on her way and returned to the tenderhouse to face my coworker’s wrath. But fortunately the other flag person was my witness. The guy was eventually fired, but not before screaming at me, and getting inches from my face, while 5 coworkers and a supervisor looked down at their shoes and said nothing.
And he sued the company saying he was wrongfully terminated, so I had to appear in court and relive the whole sordid mess over again about 8 months later. We won, of course. He didn’t have a leg to stand on.
Even so, I’m left with a legacy of nightmares. They’re not as frequent as they used to be, but they still sneak up on me every now and then. That woman could have been my mother, and she could have died right before my very eyes. It was a very near thing. Even 6 years later, it makes me nauseous just thinking about it.
(Here’s the bridge at full open, with a red arrow indicating where she was perched. It doesn’t look like much from here, but that’s a 40 foot drop down to some concrete pilings and the river.)
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