Three heroic Lindsay Brothers Transport truckies have been praised for their actions, going above and beyond the call of duty to render assistance at the scene of a crash.
The crash occurred on 8 January at Heaslip Road, Waterloo Corner, SA. Craig Bensch was travelling at approximately 90 km/h when a car suddenly pulled out in front of him without any warning.
“I was driving down Heaslip Road and saw a green Commodore edging its nose out onto the street. He came to a complete stop, but then out of nowhere hit the accelerator. There was a female in the passenger seat and three kids in the back,” recalled Bensch, who is recovering from severe whiplash and internal bruising, having just left hospital yesterday.
Luckily all five passengers from the other car walked away without injury, largely thanks to Bensch’s quick thinking moments before impact. “I come from a motor racing background. In the last split second before the crash, I quickly straightened my car up and let the incident happen, I knew I couldn’t avoid it. Rather than hitting him on an angle, I pretty much had the whole front end into his car so that all of the impact went into the structural areas of the car, which stopped my car going any further into his car. They all managed to walk out fine with no assistance,” said Bensch.
“My airbags went off on impact and I remember seeing the driver and the kids looking at me as my car went into the side of his. Once the airbag went off, I couldn’t get out of the car as the door was jammed. But once I got out, I was in a lot of pain and remember a truck driver stopped and was standing on the side of the road as I fell to the ground and collapsed.”
That truck driver was Bear Bolen. He along with two other Lindsay Brothers Transport drivers were the first on the scene. “They rendered the appropriate care necessary to keep me alert and safe,” Bensch added.
Bear and one of the other drivers had just finished a long shift from Melbourne to Adelaide, and the other happened to be passing by.
Bear immediately took charge of the situation and knew exactly what to do. “He instructed one of the other drivers, Michael, to climb into my car through the passenger door to support my head until the ambos got there. He passed on info to the ambos before they got there too. Once the firies rocked up, Bear requested straight off the bat for them to bring out some oxygen because I was in shock. That’s when I knew I was in safe hands – when he started saying this is what I need, this is what you need to do, I knew he had the right training and that got me through until the ambos rocked up. There was also another Lindsay Brothers truckie who parked his truck to block oncoming traffic,” explained Bensch.
Still on the mend from his injuries, Bensch is grateful for the actions of the three truckies who came to his aid. “I believe they should be recognised for their efforts and would personally like to say that I am forever grateful to them all. Lindsay Brothers Transport has three drivers who that day showed me the morals of the company of which they work for.
“Bear took the lead and is a true leader, who showed me that the company has some great drivers that are of the highest standards. They opened my eyes up to see that there’s still nice people out there. With everything going on in the world at the moment, you don’t see a lot of that anymore.”