New Year's Day comes with boom for Spencer, Libby & Powell
A view of the 2021 Subaru Forrester in the viewing room at Spencer, Libby and Powell Funeral Home at 1100 Kelly Avenue, The Dalles, on New Year’s Day.
By Tom Peterson
Mark Powell stands behind the caution tape where a Subaru ran into the Spencer, Libby & Powell Funeral Home on New Year’s Day.
Photos from Spencer, Libby & Powell
Mark Powell heard a giant boom at about 10:15 a.m. on New Year’s Day.
He was in his vehicle in the parking lot behind Spencer, Libby & Powell Funeral home.
The boom, he said; it was unusual.
“I never heard a noise like that before.”
But Mark was texting his son, and he finished the text and then walked down the breezeway - the driveway that runs between the two buildings at the funeral home
And he noticed something a little odd.
The Christmas wreath from the funeral home’s front door was laying in the street.
That didn’t seem right, he said and he took a look around the corner of the building.
“I looked around the corner, and I had a car in my lobby,” he said.
A real mind bender - A view of the Forrester. It’s almost uncanny to understand how the vehicle was able to get up four feet - the height of the porch - to strike the funeral home at 1l00 Kelly Avenue. However, tire tracks on the concrete runner at the far left reveal tire marks. The vehicle apparently drove up the runner like a ramp before striking the brick wall and entering the building.
A 2021 Black Subaru Forrester had been heading east on 10th Street and the driver had fallen asleep, according to The Dalles Police Log.
The car went across 10th Street and hit the curb in front of Spencer Libby and Powell. It appears its left front tire ran up the concrete runner on the side of the entrance steps to the front door as a ramp to climb up four plus feet before striking the front door and the brick of the building. The Forrester crashed through the wall. It went through the lobby then through an interior wall and into the viewing room of the funeral home before coming to a stop.
No one was in the lobby or viewing room at the time of the wreck.
Here is a sideview of the Forrester as it sat almost entirely in the funeral home.
No skid marks or tire tread can be seen in the grass where the car jumped the curb.
“That’s a good Dukes of Hazzard right there,” Mark said.
Powell said the driver was in shock when he exited the vehicle.
“The guy first crawled out and did not remember anything,” Mark said.
“This stuff happens,” Mark said, noting he held no ill will and was glad to see the man did not appear to be injured. “That’s why we have insurance… We’ve all made mistakes.”
Drowsy Driving
The Automobile Association of America did a study in 2018 and found the problem of drowsy sleeping was much worse than first believed – a shocking 9.5 percent of all crashes, and 11 percent of the crashes that resulted in significant property damage, involve sleepy drivers.
In an AAA survey, nearly all drivers say that drowsy driving is a serious safety threat, yet 3 out of 10 respondents admitted to driving when they were so tired they had a hard time keeping their eyes open on at least one occasion in the past month.
Police Log
The Forrester was driven by “Mika Lawson” according to The Dalles Police log. “According to Mika he fell asleep. He did not stop but continued eastbound and into the front offices of SLP. The vehicle had to jump a 4-foot-plus retaining wall and went through two rooms. Mika was taken to MCMC.”
No Service Interruption
The damage to the funeral home has led Powell to rearrange access to the building but it will cause no disruption of services, he said.
“We re-arranged the floor plan,” he said. Visitors can enter the office via the door in the breezeway.
Support Local News
Available to everyone; Funded by readers.
Not the first, but definitely the worst
Mark said this was the fourth such accident that has occurred at the funeral home, but noted this was the most severe in terms of damage.
In fact, Mark’s dad James worked with the City of The Dalles in 1984 to create the flower bed and bump out to correct the flow of traffic on 10th Street across from the funeral home.
James who passed in 2004, Mark’s mom Mary Ann Jeffreys, Beverly Jeffreys and Fidel Martinez have been maintaining those gorgeous flowerbeds ever since.
