There were bodies everywhere …
Photo from Creative Commons
“There were bodies everywhere …” – Lucerne Valley was a tragic scene of carnage at 7:48 p.m. on Sunday, August 15. A 19-year-old girl named Niky Carmikle was there with her boyfriend. In fact, she had left her seat temporarily, and returned to find that her boyfriend, and seven others were crushed by the car.
“There were bodies everywhere,” Carmikle said (quoted from The Press Enterprise).
Investigators called to the scene said there were no barriers between the race track and the audience. In fact, the audience was standing so close they could be described as the wall. Except, of course, it was a wall made only of flesh and bone. A wall made up of the very substance that a wall would have been protecting.
Brett Sloppy, owner of Misery Motorsports in San Marcos, was the driver of the Ford Ranger that careened into the audience. While he was not hurt physically, I imagine the pain of knowing he was at least partially responsible for these deaths. It was an accident, though, and most of the responsibility ought to be laid on the organizers of the event.
Everyone in attendance were very much like the Desert Dogs. The Press Enterprise put it this way, “Many of the spectators were cut from a similar cloth of adventuring and hanging out in the desert.”
To our fallen desert rats, rest in peace.
The desert dogs and the people at this event actually are total opposites. Although I respect offroad folks enjoying their sport in assigned areas; the damage (environment and vandalism) caused by them in unauthorized areas is appalling.
I meant to add foremost; my thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of those who perished in this accident.
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