By: Douglas Heizer
It was just a few months ago – in April — that I shared with you some thoughts about a highway tragedy that, for my family and me, hit very close to home.
It was a difficult thing to do, following a fatal accident that was totally unexpected.
Today, I have to do it again. The crash of a motorcycle and truck in Coconut Creek Sunday has taken the life of a young man who has been a friend of my family since we first moved here.
Coconut Creek police say the collision of a motorcycle and a pickup truck killed both drivers. David Da Silva, 18, of Boca Raton, was on the motorcycle heading north on Lyons Road when the collision occurred about 3 a.m. Sunday at Lyons Road and Hillsboro Boulevard.
Douglas Heizer
David’s family moved next door to us a short time after we arrived in the United States. He became a close friend of my son, Pedro, who is just a little older than he was. But our family and the Da Silvas were very close.
David graduated from Boca Raton HighSchool this year and had recently bought the motorcycle he dreamed of getting, friends told the Sun Sentinel.
Pedro said he and David used to chum around a lot when we lived near each other. Then, David’s family moved away. “But even after that, we still talked,” Pedro said.
A few years later, when Pedro was a senior at Olympic Heights High School, David enrolled as a freshman. They began to hang out together again, at least for that year.
Since Pedro graduated from high school, he and David have been keeping in touch via Facebook.
David was a very friendly boy, and was apparently liked by many. The Sun Sentinel said that by Tuesday, David’s memorial page on Facebook had more than 1,400 followers, with several of them sharing loving memories of him. A photo of David displayed on the page shows him sitting proudly on his motorcycle.
The entire Heizer family offers David’s family our deepest sympathies at this tragic time.
Events like this make me pray for everyone who has to drive Florida’s congested highways every day. I talked about it back in April when 20-year-old Danyl Dubsky, another family friend, was killed on State Road 7 approaching Sandalfoot Boulevard when his SUV struck the traffic signal pole at the northwest corner of the intersection.
In both of these cases, it took only a moment to snuff out a life.
Again, I have been thinking about teenagers as they approach the age when they can get a driver’s license and go places with their friends and family. I wonder if they truly realize how dangerous driving can be. Certainly they hear enough about the hazards of the road in school and driver education classes.
I look at my own children and wonder how hurt I would be if one of them suddenly died in a car accident. I’ve heard the word “senseless” used to describe many auto crashes. Actually, ALL traffic accidents are senseless, whether there is a specific cause or just a set of unfortunate circumstances.
As I said once before, we take two lessons away with us today: To hold those we love close to us and pay strict attention to the overriding need to drive safely.