If you crash your car at low speed and you’re buckled in with your seatbelt, you can easily get hurt and destroy the vehicle. When you crash at high speeds, like a Texas drunk driving suspect did recently, you can cause a lot more damage.

He was driving on an Interstate in Arlington, Texas when he crashed into a pole. A passerby noticed the car was propped up and wrapped around the pole, so he pulled over close by. That’s when he noticed the vehicle was on fire.

There were three people in the vehicle but no one seemed to know it was on fire. The driver was unconscious behind the wheel while a passenger was on the phone with police. The witness noticed the fire was spreading and began urging the occupants to get out, and he and another person dragged the driver, still unconscious, out of the car and toward safety.

That’s when the flames began rising, and had the witness not come upon the car and helped, the people inside may not have made it out. When the driver woke up the witness asked him if he was drunk and he replied yes, he had been drinking. For making the choice to drink and drive, he lost his vehicle to a fire. He’ll most likely be facing drunk driving charges as well.

Thankfully, this Texas drunk driving crash had a somewhat happy ending. All of the occupants survived what could have been a fatal crash. Many drunk drivers aren’t so lucky. Hitting a solid object at a high rate of speed can kill you instantly, and even if you live, if you’re too drunk to get out of the car and it starts on fire like this vehicle did, help may not arrive in time.

This type of crash can happen to anyone who drinks and drives, so think before you drink and hand the keys to a sober driver.

About Matt Talley