I had one of the most frightening moments of my life a week ago. I left work (downtown Detroit) at 5pm, and the back-ups to get onto the Lodge freeway were horrifying. Sometimes it can get a little crazy and back up for 10 or 15 minutes, but this was especially bad. Nothing was moving. It took me over an hour to get one mile; I was caught and couldn't turn around. When I dropped about halfway down the entrance ramp to the Lodge freeway, my heart skipped a beat or two. There before me was a raging, Class III river of the likes I have never seen before, especially on a freeway. ;--)

We got about three inches of rain in about 20 minutes, so the downhill portion of the freeway was under water. There were zillions of cars with no place to go. Many were stalled. The bad thing was the rapids. There were vicious-looking rapids just rockin' the water, and only a few cars went through it. The water was above their bumpers. So everyone sat there, scared and not moving. Then I hit the water's edge.

There was no where to turn, no where to get out. I sat there and stared at that water for five minutes, and so did everyone else. No one else went. I was driving my PT Cruiser. (Where was my steady old truck when I needed it?)

So I made the risky decision to cross the raging animal. I went super slow, and then I saw it: a whirlpool. It seems that there was a sewer lid thrown off, and suction from the hole created a wicked whirlpool, tossing the cover around like a frisbee in the water. I went around that puppy, and the water came up about midway on my doors. The rapid's splash was washing up my windows. My heartbeat could be heard for miles (I insist!).

Then I hit the other side - pavement - and felt like I had just survived a flash flood in the Grand Canyon. How I avoided getting washed up like an upside-down boat ... I will never know. Those Pirellis stuck to the ground beneath, and I managed to wing my way through a potential death trap.

I heard from my co-workers, who hit that area after I did, that the cops eventually closed off the whole area and moved cars up the down ramp to clear the freeway. But that was hours later. I was home safely by then.