T-Bone accident

Moderators,
I am not sure where to post this, please move to appropriate form. This just my experience and thoughts based on what we have been through.

On 15[SUP]th[/SUP] Jan 2016 evening Me, DH and DS were on our way back home and it was a regular day. I was driving, my DH was seated in the passenger side and DS (19 months) was in his toddler seat in the middle at back.
We were almost home, just had to take left at next lights, I was in the left most lane in a 3 lane 2 way street at about 25-30MPH and traffic was regular after office rush. All of a sudden I heard a loud boom and didn’t know what happened and next think I see is my car is rotated 360 degree and there is smoke all around. I looked at my DH side there were airbags all along the passenger side and he was staring at me and from the windshield I saw a black Toyota car and it’s front bonnet was open and it was at the same place where I last remember driving, then I realized that it was an accident. Immediately I looked at my DS, he was in his car seat, looking puzzled, As soon as I asked him “Are you okay baby” he started crying. Since there was no traffic on my side, I came out of my car and took my DS out. Then a person came to me asked “Are you okay, is every one fine. Don’t worry it’s not your fault”. Then the other person who hit came by running seeing my DS and said “I am sorry it’s totally my fault.” I was literally shaking and could not speak, and then he asked my DS are you fine and went back to his car. My DH came to me and said it’s a T-bone, I am calling cops. Then the regular formalities, of towing, cops etc happened.
By god’s grace, all three of us are fine. My DS was back to his normal state after 15 min. After going home and thinking through what happened we were terrified and thanked ourselves that we bought a big SUV after DS was born. I couldn’t imagine what would have happened if it was small car like CIVIC.
The other guy hit directly at the passenger side door where my DH was seated and my DH felt the car rotating and for second he thought he was going to die. Thanks to side door air bags that protected him.
When I was pregnant I had a Honda accord and my DH had Acura TL. I wanted to trade in my Honda and take a SUV as it would good for baby car seat etc, but my DH wanted a small car and use TL whenever travelling with baby. His reason for taking small car was to save some extra money, rather than spending on SUV. But I was completely against small car and since I was selling my car I wanted an SUV. We looked into different types of SUV’s but liked only Acura MDX and it was over our budget and mean while unexpectedly I got good deal for my accord and sold it. For 3-4 months we maintained on 1 car during my maternity leave. Just 15 days before my joining back to office to office we faced with same question what car? Small one or SUV? One of our friends was also looking for SUV and he negotiated good price for buying two SUV’s and we bought an Acura MDX. Though I was happy but my DH was not as it was bit heavy on his wallet. But today after this incident we are happy we made that decision.

My main reason for sharing this is, safety is always important, mainly if you have kids and family. If you are planning to buy a car, please look into options of buying one with good security features, mainly air bags, automatic breaks etc.
We lost one of our good friend 5 years ago on 17[SUP]th[/SUP] Jan 2011 in T-Bone accident. It was direct hit at driver side, he was driving Civic base model and the other vehicle was jeep, driven by teens. The worst part is, it was near his home and then teens missed the STOP sign and were speeding.

 

@Minon,
Thanks, We are safe and I thank my stars. Yes, its worst when you are all alone in this country and in an accident, can't imagine what we will go through.

@shakee
Thanks god you and your kid are safe. I can understand the trauma you are going through. T-Bone are the worst accidents with maximum injury. For some reason I am seeing lot of accidents in TX. I have not seen these many VA or NJ. If at all you can afford an a SUV please do consider it, nothing more than family safety.

We are waiting for other party insurance to call and i hope they total the car and we can get new one. Till now my DH was planning on taking coupe after trading in his TL which is almost 7 years old. Now he wants an SUV for himself too.

 

@Minion,
Yes sure will do. In our case we are not at fault and have told our insurance and not involve in any claims and will do directly from the other person's insurance. He has good insurance too.

Initially they towed our car to a local body shop that night. Next day we spoke to our dealer to get an estimate. The dealer has asked us not to sign any parers with body shop and as per state law we can choose where to get our car repaired. As expected the body shop person tried to convince saying about low cost, no car fax report etc. My DH was firm on getting it repaired at dealer collision center and did not sign any. We called insurance and asked them to tow it to the dealer collision center (Even insurance have their preferred body shop and were trying to refer).

As of now they are doing interviews and medical examinations. We are waiting for the estimate from insurance agent and as per Texas law there is diminished value claim. I not sure about the details of that. Will keep updated about it one we get to that point.