An Unexpected Death in Our Collective Taxi Family

I have the worse of news to report.  My friend Jack Magerstaedt, the driver involved in the black ice accident last Monday, has unexpectedly succumbed to injuries related to that unfortunate event.  The communal family that is Yellow Taxi/BYG is in complete shock.  This is the story as well as I know it.  I can say that this is the first driver death directly related to injuries sustained in a crash that I know of.  A couple of years ago an Orange taxi driver died on State Highway 509 after spinning out on an icy roadway.  He was killed as he stepped out upon the roadway and struck by a passing car. Jack's story is unusual because he was released from Harborview on Monday.  I will have further details later but this is the tale as I currently understand it.  As I initially said, even Jack thought his injuries were not serious. I am extremely curious to know more.

Saturday Afternoon the superintendent's office received an unusual telephone call from Harborview, asking if they knew anything about Jack's next of kin.  Oddly, the folks would not say why they wanted the information.  Alarmed, I was contacted and asked to go to Harborview and find out what was going on.  No one answered at Jack's home. Finally, at about 10 PM Saturday evening I made it to Harborview and indeed Jack had been admitted.  Arriving at the assigned floor, a very friendly nurse told me that Jack had been readmitted to the hospital due to breathing problems related to thirteen rib fractures.  At that very moment he was having a breathing tube inserted and that there would be a wait of about 30 minutes before I could see him.  Reassured that all of this was routine, I told her to just tell him that I had come by and would visit him later.  This afternoon, at about three PM, when I was about an hour away from dropping by, Tina from Yellow called, being extremely distraught, telling me that the hospital had just called and Jack had passed away.  That is where the story currently stands, more coming as I know it.  A more detailed Mexico City report will be coming later this week.  I am exhausted and looking forward to an extended sleep.