It happened approximately twenty-five years ago, and why I now include this story of my experience because the woman I was with did not want to get involved.
The only phone I could use to make calls was a public phone box on the other side of the park’s gates, where I had to insert coins to make an emergency call.
We both were studying a course called an Associate Diploma in Applied Science in Animal Technology. One of our projects was to study nocturnal animals and produce a report for our lecturer the next day.
On the way out of the park, she asked whether she could take one more look at the kangaroos grazing near the exit. I turned the car towards them, and as I stopped at the fence line, my car started to sink into the soft ground; my vehicle ended with the back wheels not level with the earth, and my front wheels had disappeared into the mud. I tried to reverse my car without success.
We had three dogs with us and had to leave them behind in the car with the lights on.
It was pitch dark by this time, and the only light we saw came from the public phone box in the park. So we had to follow the white line on the road back to the park’s entrance.
I made several calls to the emergency services when I mentioned where this accident occurred. I was disconnected. I pleaded with the following operator not to hang up on me as I had used the last of my coins.
I told the operator that I had three dogs in the car and another woman besides myself; unfortunately, I could not explain further due to the location of the accident.
Each operator I spoke to disconnected my call when they were informed where the accident occurred.
Emergency services failed in their duty of care by disconnecting my calls to them for help.
Twelve o’clock at midnight, and we are still in the park! I remembered a park ranger’s house near the entrance to the park and hoped to get the park ranger’s attention. As it was too dark, we decided not to go to the ranger’s hut for fear of having an accident.
I suggested to my friend to wait at the entrance to the park to see whether we could flag anybody passing by. It seemed like an absurd idea because it was very late.
I told my friend before she left to start praying, and I also prayed that some miracle would happen. A short time later, I noticed a set of headlights moving across the horizon and not heading our way, and I kept thinking; please, God send him a message to come our way.
As I watched the driver turn his vehicle, a wave of relief came over me, and I had hoped this was the answer to my prayer.
My friend and I prayed to God to help us find a solution to our predicament, and within minutes found it.
The driver asked me why we were in the area so late, and I told him we had been ringing emergency services much earlier for help, and each time I mentioned the location of the accident, I was disconnected.
The driver’s reaction was total disbelief! His following remark was that we were lucky because he usually did not drive along the road we were on, but he had a gut feeling to do so.
I asked whether he noticed a car upended with a light on his way past, and he did. I told him I needed help to get my car back on the road and asked whether he could help. He wondered whether I had a tow bar. Yes! He had a tow rope.
Was this driver at the right place and time to receive a hunch to turn his vehicle onto the road, which he usually did not use and save us?
Is this what we call “Divine Intervention”